Not long after I had been called to the bar, there was someone who was having a Halloween party. (I wore my gown.) And there was a lesbian there, who was there with her kid. And she said "See that woman? That's a lawyer. Never trust a lawyer." And that was kind of, well, I mean it's true. The legal profession is the embodiment of patriarchy, so she wasn't wrong. On the one hand. On the other hand it was devastating to me, because it, it was kind of a price. Do you want your profession or d'you want your politics? Do you want your profession? Do you want your community? First of all, the other impulses in, um, feminism at the time, were anti-hierarchical, uhm... communitarian, egalitarian... all of the times that the legal profession is not. So, people were not wrong to mistrust the legal profession, but there was a point at which it felt like I was standing on, on, y'know, and it was getting harder and harder and harder to maintain that in myself. Not in the world, but in myself.

One of my favourite lesbian lawyer stories is, well the Trinity Western fight originated with TWU's request to the Law Society to be accredited as an institution whose law school would produce graduates who were entitled to be called to the bar. And the Board of Governors of the Law Society, who are called benchers, initially granted that authorization. Uhm, there's a guy in Victoria whose name is Mike Mulligan. Straight white dude, a criminal lawyer. I dunno where he gets his social conscience, but he's amazing. He put out a call for a special general meeting of the law society, because the membership has the power to overturn decisions of the board of directors as long as they have a sufficiently large majority. In this case, some of the, it was either two-thirds of three-quarters of the law society members, so, it was a lot. That, that annual general meeting rolled around, and, that I was involved with Mike, and we did, I did an unbelievable amount of organizing. Like, to make sure that people voted. Got out and voted at this special general meeting. And at the meeting, the meeting was held in 13, I think, locations around the province that were connected. And the plan was that he was gonna introduce the motion, and I was gonna second it. Well, I looked up and the president was already organizing her papers, and no Mike, so, I thought, well, so I, I, passed a note up to the president and said I'll move the motion. And I stood up. It was kind of an amazing moment actually, 'cause we had the sexual orientation gender identity crew, which I also formed in 1993, had, we had gotten together and we had rainbow stickers. And as people came into the room, if they were supportive we gave them a rainbow sticker. And it was wonderful, 'cause as the room filled up there was this roomful of rainbow stickers and "Oh god, I think we've got it!"