Lessons From the Cockpit

I flew to Lincoln last Friday to visit my daughter Tammy and take in the Big 10 opener between the Huskers and Badgers. It was a thrilling game – made more so by Nebraska depositing the pigskin on the turf on 2 of its first five plays from scrimmage – and a great fall weekend overall. Saturday morning we sampled scones from the Farmer’s Market at Lincoln’s historic Haymarket over coffee at The Mill. Sunday we flew up to Barnstormers restaurant in Norfolk for lunch, and on the way back found the Camp Fontanelle corn maze.

Tuesday morning as I was pre-flighting my plane for the return to Boulder and work, I wondered how many of the lessons and pithy proverbs I have learned as a pilot translate to legal ethics and the practice of law. The legal profession is not without its own collection of colorful maxims. I am particularly fond of the one attributed to Sol Wachtler, former chief judge of New York's court of appeals, that a prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich. I have no doubt of Sol’s wisdom, having witnessed some rather suspicious pork in my own hydrator on occasion. (For lovers of legal etymology and phrase origins I recommend Law Talk: The Unknown Stories Behind Familiar Legal Expressions.) 

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