"The magic that was me learning from you" -Mary Lu B

Vanessa,

Do you have any idea when the word "mentor" came into fashion? I don't, but I do know it was after the magic that was me learning from you. Sometimes it was, as someone said, a long email (I didn't say rant, because although it was impassioned and righteous, it was also just simply right). Other times it was just that famous scowl that made me take a second look at what had just been said. Our friend Howard wrote an article about Infinity in a Grain of Sand and I think you shared that ability - or maybe you helped him to see it - to see through to the core of the good or the evil that was enrobed in what appeared otherwise to be a perfectly logical way to approach the situation. I feel like you spent a long time trying to suss me out, to determine whether I really was or could be part of the solution (I was so apparently, on the surface, not likely to be that). At some point, I think you decided "yea" about me and that means the world to me. But I wax romantic… I always say I was raised by clinical teachers, and what I mean is that you were my dad. Forgive the genderedness of it, and know that many, many people in legal education assume I was a clinical teacher, which I consider the highest praise and which is evidence of what a great job you did. Anyway, mentor/schmentor, thank you!

Mary Lu B