Victor asked Francisco X. Stork:

One of your characters in "Marcelo in the Real World" says, "I could be a lawyer, but then that wide green pasture in my brain would lie fallow. What a waste that would be, huh?" Since you are still a lawyer, do you find that writing is your chance to explore that wide green pasture in your brain? I would think practicing law has enough intellectual challenges of its own.

Francisco X. Stork Thank you Victor. I think that to continue the metaphor, if creative writing is a wide green pasture, legal writing and thinking is a narrow, well fenced path. In the green pasture you are free to wonder and imagine destinations never quite sure exactly where you are headed. In the narrow path one turn leads you to logically choose one way over another until you arrive at the place you foresaw all along. They are both challenging ways of thinking and depending on who you are, one is probably easier than the other. Ideally, to be whole, it be great to be good at both types of thinking. But imagining and making up characters and places has always giving me more joy. It is much more like play, which is the essence of creativity. By the way, I just retired last week from practicing law for thirty-three years. I'm hoping to play more now. ;-)

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