Desert Sunrise
I was asked last night how I could work and still write stories every day. It’s 6am here in the desert and the sun is just rising. I am sitting and following my passion to write…each and every day. I not only write on days I work, but I write on days when I am not working (it’s Sunday today). I write in the morning. I write during breaks in the day. I write while in repose. I write at while waiting for my wife or for people to gather. I even write when I can’t sleep and I wake up in the middle of the night. I think it’s fair to say that I write because I must.
The peacefulness of a desert sunrise is somehow better than the serenity of a pacific sunset. I am, by nature, a morning person. The morning sun has something in it which prompts the release of brain candy, serotonin. Just like darkness releases melatonin to cause you to sleep. Serotonin boosts your mood, keeps you calm and focused and gets you on your way. Add the clarity and freshness of the desert air on a Spring day and you have a cocktail sure to not disappoint. What could go wrong on a day that starts this way?
I wish I hadn’t asked that. I deplete my feel-good just thinking about all the shit that can rain down upon me on any given day. I was told yesterday that a man with legal papers had come to my door last night looking for me. I know what it was. I was called on Thursday and told that I had been enjoined in a lawsuit over a prior deal. I understand litigation tactics well enough to know that I am not the target, but rather a good witness. So they enjoin me to get me to agree to testify. My pockets are not deep enough compared to the billionaires I worked with to bother suing. But on the off-chance that I am mad at my ex-partners, I am enjoined to bear witness by the prosecution. It does not bother me, but the drama of the service process is never something to be missed. “You’ve been served.” It’s a drama meant to intimidate.
For someone who has been in the business world for forty-five years, I am proud to say that I have only been sued twice now. I sued only once, in connection to the first lawsuit against me. Both times, I was served at my house on a Friday or Saturday night. Again, intentional drama since I had already told the prosecutors that my lawyer would accept service. But where’s the fun in that?
The first lawsuit involved me suing two Israelis who regularly traveled to New York. I had requested a law firm that would accept process and they had declined. This is tantamount to saying, “Catch me if you can!” So, I heard they were coming into New York and alerted my lawyers. The first guy got nailed checking into his favorite hotel. The second guy was quite wiley. My process server went to his New York office, but they said he was not there even though he could be seen through the glass office walls. The process server waited for him at the exit, but he snuck out a back way, intentionally playing cat and mouse to avoid service. He got nailed in line at the El Al counter at JFK and declared to people who he knew would tell me, that it was the most humiliating moment of his life. My view is quite simple, don’t play cat and mouse if you don’t want the cat to catch you.
I was involved in a massive financial debacle twelve years ago. It involved running an area where investors lost 1.5 billion dollars with the high-profile collapse of a turbulent market. The unit I ran as the CEO had three-hundred criminal, civil, arbitration and regulatory actions filed against it. I was named in none. Some may think I was lucky, but I have a very simple theory. If you are honest, open and direct, the litigation world will pass you by and decide you are simply no fun at all. That’s what happened then. That’s what happened eventually with that Israeli lawsuit. That is what will likely happen this time. If you don’t lie and deflect, there is so little lawyers can grab onto that they step around you to find someone they can better play with.
Look at what’s happening in Washington right now or in almost any scandal ofthe past. It is never the act that catches wrong-doers. It is the cover-up, of even more often, the lying about the cover-up, that catches them. Trump has been largely absolved of his Russian collusion/conspiracy charges (or at least there is too little hard evidence to indict), but he is guilty as hell of obstructing justice to keep people from knowing about or being able to prove the very acts that he has successfully avoided prosecution about. How ridiculous is that? And how crazy is it that his lieutenants are all gradually getting strung up for lying to prevent others from learning about what he supposedly didn’t do. People are going to jail for playing cat and mouse with the truth. And so they should.
I am not self-righteous about making mistakes or even larcenous acts. But for the life of me I cannot understand how people can convince themselves that lying and skulking from the truth will set them free. The only thing that sets you free is telling the truth and doing a proper mea culpa. I have always found apologies to be the most surprising and disarming weapon in my arsenal. People don’t know what to do with it other than smile and move on.
It’s like a desert sunrise. Crisp, clean, cleansing and final.