Mentorship Over Medium-Rare

November 21, 2024

Thinking back on the Chicago trip. It really was a special kind of turning point, the moment the curtain was well and truly pulled back on the grand production that is the JSD program. But one particular incident from that era really takes the cake.

It started sometime this fall. I had gently floated the idea that perhaps discussing the finer points of Chapter 11 over a greasy burger wasn't the pinnacle of academic rigor. It’s a special kind of challenge, you see, trying to flip through a dense treatise on corporate restructuring while simultaneously preventing ketchup from decorating your laptop. When I brought this up with my advisor, Professor Pigou, his reasoning was profound: after four whole days on campus, he simply couldn’t bear the sight of it for a fifth. A true man of leisure.

So, I turned to the student grapevine, whispering my woes to a fellow traveler in this academic odyssey. The hope was that my tale would, through a series of fortunate whispers, eventually land on the desk of someone with a title. The gist was simple: our Socratic dialogues consisted of me asking questions into the void, followed by a new 400-page reading assignment due in approximately 72 hours. I also harbored a growing, sneaking suspicion that my guide through the thickets of bankruptcy law was perhaps just as lost as I was. My confidant, bless his heart, asked the obvious: “Why didn’t you pick the other professor, the one who’s actually a top professional?” A fair question. My answer was that I hadn’t known him. And in my private defense, even with full foreknowledge, I doubt I’d have signed up to study under this particular paragon of lawlessness.

Well, lo and behold, my message must have completed its clandestine journey. First, our weekly Friday meetings magically migrated from the world of laminated menus to a university library room. I received an email from his assistant, cheerfully informing me that our meeting was scheduled for the library — “as [she has] done the last couple Fridays.” An interesting take on the word “as,” given its previous definition involved a menu and a check. He paid it all, no complaints there.

Around this time, he also acquired a teaching assistant. The student was introduced to the class as a veritable genius, a prodigy of exam-taking, all delivered with that special, tight-lipped smile the professor reserves for statements of questionable veracity. It was this new TA, along with another student, who accompanied me on that fateful trip to Chicago.

And it was in the cozy confines of the car that the other shoe dropped. Amidst the casual chatter, it was revealed that our esteemed University of Illinois wasn’t exactly a golden ticket. Apparently, top recruiters from Chicago and other big cities considered a visit to our campus a geographical inconvenience they were happy to avoid. This nugget of information, as you might imagine, didn’t exactly fill me with confidence.

So, naturally, I decided to share my newfound anxiety with my mentor. Where did this heart-to-heart take place? You guessed it. We were back at our usual haunt, a temple of culinary delights where hamburgers and fried eggs reign supreme.

“Professor,” I began, “there’s something bothering me.”

He looked up at me, wearing an expression that was a masterpiece of conflicting emotions: part “Oh God, what now?” and part “Do I really have to pause chewing for this?”

I laid out the story from the car ride, the whispers of our university’s less-than-stellar reputation. I suppose I was looking for a comforting “Nonsense, my boy!” or at least some sage advice. What I got was something else entirely.

“I don’t want to hear any of this shit,” he declared, with all the professorial grace he could muster. He then informed me that another such outburst of concern would mark the end of our beautiful academic relationship.

A brief, vivid image of my Coke glass making a very personal introduction to his face flashed through my mind. But then, the equally vivid images of deportation papers and a revoked LLM degree brought me back to reality. I briefly wondered about the legal gymnastics required to use his colorful language against him, should he ever deny dropping an S-bomb on a student while mid-chew on a burger. Not that I was eating; it’s hard to have an appetite when you feel like your dinner companion is mentally counting every swallow you take.

His stated purpose for being there, he reminded me, was to discuss bankruptcy (a topic we were revolutionizing, one onion ring at a time), not to waste his time on my “useless talk.”

I calmly explained that I wasn’t trying to waste his time, merely sharing a significant concern that was, you know, bothering me greatly. But some people just lack a certain… nuance. A feel for the room. Especially when the room smells of fried bacon.