especially when instructed to hurry. I, on the other hand, power walked even
during my leisure hours and had a hard time decelerating. But I remember how
that night I counseled myself to slow down, just a little—just enough so that I
could hear what he was saying, because it was beginning to dawn on me that I
cared about hearing everything he said.
Until now, I’d constructed my existence carefully, tucking and folding every
loose and disorderly bit of it, as if building some tight and airless piece of origami.
I had labored over its creation. I was proud of how it looked. But it was delicate.
If one corner came untucked, I might discover that I was restless. If another
popped loose, it might reveal I was uncertain about the professional path I’d so
deliberately put myself on, about all the things I told myself I wanted. I think
now it’s why I guarded myself so carefully, why I still wasn’t ready to let him in.
He was like a wind that threatened to unsettle everything.
A day or two later, Barack asked if I could give him a ride to a barbecue for
summer associates, which was happening that weekend at a senior partner’s home
in one of the wealthy lakefront suburbs north of the city. The weather, as I
remember it, was clear that day, the lake sparkling at the edge of a well-tended
lawn. A caterer served food as music blared over stereo speakers and people
remarked on the tasteful grandeur of the house. The whole milieu was a portrait
of affluence and ease, a less-than-subtle reminder of the payoff that came when
you committed yourself wholeheartedly to the grind. Barack, I knew, wrestled
with what he wanted to do with his life, which direction his career would take.
He had an uneasy relationship with wealth. Like me, he’d never had it, and he
didn’t aspire to it, either. He wanted to be effective far more than he wanted to
be rich but was still trying to figure out how.
We walked through the party not quite like a couple but still mostly
together, drifting between clusters of colleagues, drinking beer and lemonade,
eating hamburgers and potato salad from plastic plates. We’d get separated and
then find each other again. It all felt natural. He was quietly flirty with me and I
was flirty back. Some of the men started playing pickup basketball, and I watched
as Barack moseyed on over to the court in his flip-flops to join. He had an easy
rapport with everyone at the firm. He addressed all the secretaries by name and
got along with everyone—from the older, stuffier lawyers to the ambitious young
bucks who were now playing basketball. He’s a good person, I thought to myself,
watching him pass the ball to another lawyer.
Having sat through scores of high school and college games, I recognized a