Seidemann: The lessons I learned

Posted

From the other side of the bench

By David Seidemann

Issue of August 6, 2010/ 26 Av 5770

My office phone rang the other day and a gentleman on the line identified himself as Darrell. I asked how I could be of service. “They got me for armed robbery in 2008,” he replied. Before I could tell him I don’t practice criminal law anymore, he explained, “And to be honest Mr. Seidemann, I don’t recall robbing anyone in 2008.” I asked him about the status of his case and he told me he had pleaded guilty. How I could be of service? He wanted to “unplead,” retroactively, to clear his name and polish up his resume.

At every stage in life one should never pass up the opportunity to pad one’s resume. Not for ego purposes, but for the purpose of embracing new challenges and opening new doors. No one knows what the future will bring. With every person you meet comes a new opportunity to enhance your life and change your perspective. There is no such thing, at least by my thinking, as a chance encounter.

Back in February, when I was a candidate for the United States Congress, I met with the local board of rabbis. Most of them knew me from the neighborhood, but there were a few rabbis I did not know. One, Rabbi Barry Bessler, also serves as a dean of Touro College in Flatbush.

I graduated from Touro College and went on to receive my law degree from Touro’s law school. I also served as the director of admissions for the undergraduate division in the early 1980’s. I spent many precious moments with Touro’s president and founder, Rabbi Dr. Bernard Lander, of blessed memory, and considered him a mentor.

When I heard of the opening to teach a law class at Touro College this summer I jumped at the opportunity. Who was in charge of the program? That same Rabbi Bressler that I met earlier. A phone call later the job was mine, a teaching experience that I could add to my resume.

I completed my first lecture on Monday night — two-and-a-half hours of non-stop talking. My voice was shot and then I realized I had to do it again the next night and four nights a week for the next four weeks.

There is an old saying that circulates around law schools: Those who can practice law, do, and those who can’t, teach. After one night in the classroom I reject that notion wholeheartedly.

The judges that I appear in front of every day have heard it all before. Understandably, they are a bit jaded. So, too, are the attorneys with whom I interact each day; I also suffer from burnout at times as the grind continues. The names change but the storyline remains pretty much the same. There is something so refreshing about the young mind that struggles to grasp concepts that I practice and implement by rote. There is something about the young mind that is untainted by the demands of making a living; learning now for the future, asking questions as they build their own resumes.

There is something about the world of academia that allows one to have faith in the future, that the knowledge and lessons we have acquired will be carried on by another generation; in short, it is a lesson that we don’t exist in a vacuum.

Additionally, there is something about returning to one’s alma mater to teach. It feels like coming full-circle. My one regret is that this opportunity didn’t present itself when Dr. Lander was still alive. I would have loved to walk into his office and thank him for the education he gave me and to tell him that I was here to return the favor.

I was a bit nervous when I began my first lecture. But unmistakably, I felt like I had come home after a 20-year hiatus. As I packed up my briefcase, shut the light and closed the door behind me, I was momentarily stunned when one of the students said “goodnight professor.”

I’ve been called many things in my life, some of which I can’t print in this paper, but the title bestowed upon me that night, professor, made me feel young and old at the same time. I was old enough to teach what I had learned and young enough to learn something new.

When I left Dr. Lander’s employment over 20 years ago, I presented him with what I believed to be a rare set of seforim: a commentary on the Chumash, the bible. Dr. Lander told me that he had been trying to get his hands on those volumes for years. I don’t know if Dr. Lander said that just to make me feel good, or if perhaps, Dr. Lander, the brilliant Torah scholar, somehow did not have these books in his library. At any rate, it is what he said afterwards that stuck with me.

He held the books and said “The fact that you bought me books that I did not previously own is a sign that no matter how advanced in years a man is, he can never assume that he has learned all that there is to learn.”

I learned that lesson on my first night as a professor.

David Seidemann is a partner with the law firm of Seidemann & Mermelstein. He can

be reached at (718) 692-1013 and at ds@lawofficesm.com