There is a morning in this story that I have not told you about, and I am going to tell you now.
It is the Tuesday morning in the kitchen, the email, the cold coffee, the alphabetical list. And it is also a Tuesday morning three years later, in a different kitchen, in the small house I bought with the settlement and the first year of the firm's income, with a window over the sink and a bird feeder my mother helped me hang.
I am standing at the counter with a mug of coffee and my phone is on the counter and it is 7:42 in the morning, which is the time it always is when the important things arrive. And the phone buzzes, and it is a client, a new one, a mid-size carrier that has been told by two people in the industry that I am the person to call, and they want me to review a contract befor
