Since you all are getting personal here (on something that has nothing to do with the underlying issue), here are our reasons for our family's arrangement. First, we like the quality of life here. I talk about the great beer and travel, but that's not our real ambition. The real benefit is time. We have a lot of family time, and we value it a lot. We value it more than money (though we do reasonably well) and more than I value practicing law. If we lived in Texas and practiced law, I wouldn't have a tenth of the family time I have now.
Second, I care about my son's education a lot. The educational opportunities of the public school system are ****. Yes, the politics of the system are hideous, but even if they weren't, the academic standards are in the toilet and only getting worse. The reading, math, and science curricula are crap. We wanted better for our own kid, so we homeschool him. I do this with guidance from Mrs. Deez, who's not only a master teacher in her own right but a curriculum specialist. She knows what she's doing. Furthermore, the curriculum she has put together is working wonders. He was behind in math and reading when we started two years ago - not because he isn't smart or because his teachers were bad but because the curriculum was garbage. He is far ahead in everything now. Second, Mrs. Deez has significant medical limitations. In fact, she's having a major surgery on Saturday. I can't be away at an office for 10+ hours per day plus a commute. She needs my help on a daily basis.
Third, if I really wanted to go back and practice law, I could. I have and maintain very significant connections in Austin, Houston, Waco, and the DFW area - close friends who hire lawyers themselves and are connected with others who do. One of them came to visit me three weeks ago and tried to get me to come back again. If I wanted to, I would have no trouble getting hired again.
Fourth, yes, it's good for a child to have a male role model who's working, but it's also good to have a male role model who's present. The bigger problem in our society right now isn't fathers who aren't working. It's fathers who are absent and/or checked out (whether working or not). I'm neither of those. I may not have a job, but I'm a very hardworking guy, and our son sees how productive I am. He also sees and appreciates what I do for him.
Yes, he knows our arrangement is unusual and not for everyone, and he knows why. He knows what's "normal," and we're encouraging him to go in that direction. We push career and work for him, and he wants that in his own life.
Finally, why should I come back? Unless something terrible happens, I don't need to. We have a good situation here. We make good money, have excellent medical insurance, excellent retirement, etc. Why would I leave that to work 60 hours a week in perpetual pissing matches with insurance adjusters, sit on Mopac or 360 for 2 hours a day, and live in crappy weather like I used to?
Yes, I had to give up my political ambitions, but how promising were those anyway? I'm way too fiscally and socially conservative to be anywhere near the Democratic Party, and most Republican primary voters I engaged with couldn't get beyond giving me a bunch of crap for being a "trial lawyer" (though both firms I worked for were run by conservative Christians) and frankly, I got sick of explaining and defending myself to them.
I know some other trial lawyers in the GOP play the game and are kinda apologetic for what they do just to try to move past it and keep from pissing off TLR. Well, I can't do that. TLR is a bunch of corrupt MoFos, and I'm not going to pretend they aren't. I believed in what I did, and I love and revere the 7th Amendment like I do the 2nd Amendment. I don't apologize for it, and **** anybody who would expect me to. If I got elected, I would fight those who try to hurt the 7th Amendment, like I would fight those who try to hurt the 2nd Amendment. If I didn't, I'd be violating both the oath I took when I became a lawyer and the oath of any office I'd assume if I won. And it would end my career in one term. So I don't consider the loss of my political ambitions to be of much value.
Last edited:
not always which keeps me coming back.
