Motion days are regrettably not what they were. Some lawyers tell me that they have not argued a motion in a courtroom for many months. Instead they argue them by phone or a Zoom videoconference. Back decades ago when I was a newly admitted member of the bar, which somehow seems simultaneously forever ago but just yesterday, biweekly motion days were a vibrant thing. For young lawyers it was an opportunity to meet and socialize with senior lawyers outside the courtroom and to learn from them while observing them arguing their motions before the court. In truth I think my being there virtually every other week made me, for better or worse, the lawyer that I was, the judge that I became and the mediator that I am.

Before the combined effect of COVID and Zoom, motion days were both a social and intellectual event. Lawyers were either waiting outside the courtroom in the vestibule or hallways or sitting in the courtroom awaiting their turn. Young lawyers while waiting their turn outside could meet and interact with senior lawyers which had its own value. Other young lawyers, including me, preferred to observe the lawyers in the courtroom as they argued their motions and the judge as they presided over and ruled upon the motions.