When I decided to consider bankruptcy as an alternative, I looked in the yellow pages for an attorney who handled both business and personal bankruptcy. My business was failing and once that was finished, I was out of a job. I would no longer be able to afford my home or service my debt. There weren’t many attorneys who handled both. Most offer a free initial consultation. The secretary at one office said the attorney was too busy for free consultations, but she could schedule an appointment for a $1,000 retainer. Pass.
The first attorney was a very tall gentleman, older than me by at least a decade, balding with a grey fringe of hair, and pasty, pebbly skin. He was physically mobile but seemed a bit feeble-minded, and he kept me waiting ten minutes. I asked his secretary if he was a misogynist, and she claimed he wasn’t. (I’ve worked for a lot of attorneys, and many of them were.)
So I sat in one of his two husband-and-wife chairs and he immediately wanted all my vital statistics, like a nurse in a clinic taking my blood pressure, pulse, temperature. He rarely looked at me but focused all his energy on his information sheet. I didn’t know this man, and I was just there for a free consultation, not to tell him my complete history.
I asked, “Can’t we just speak about bankruptcy in generalities at this point without going into my specific details?” He continued looking at his paper and replied, “Things are done in a certain way here (punctuating his point by stabbing his pen downward), and we either do it my way (pen down) or we don’t do it at all!” Well, my, my. I needed the information, so I capitulated. He had no idea, but he had just lost a client.
He took down all my information, name, address, phone number, where I worked, how much money I owed to whom, monthly payments. And then he started explaining bankruptcy to me. His solution was to file for bankruptcy for both the business and for myself. He claimed there was only one other attorney in Eugene who handled business bankruptcy, which was not true, as I was later to find out.
It’s a pretty complicated subject, and I wasn’t getting it all, so I began asking questions. Each time I asked a question, he got flustered, and resentfully gave me an answer. The room began heating up, or maybe it was just me that was heating up. I started feeling like a naughty girl for asking questions.
I asked a rhetorical question that begged asking, “You don’t handle questions very well, do you?” He grumpily replied, “You keep interrupting and your questions are just getting us nowhere.” And then he stormed on with his lecture like he hadn’t just been a complete ass to me. I raised my hand in the universal STOP gesture and said, “No, we’re through here,” and got up. He quickly got up and escorted me to the door and out I went.
Attorney Lesson #1: Don’t ask questions. Obey. You do whatever I tell you.
Joanne’s Lesson #1: This is your financial future and well-being. Your time is as valuable as his, and there are plenty more where he came from. Move on.
