Meanie With a Heart
Reddit user Bn_scarpia thought that his wife’s co-worker, who’s a lawyer, was a total dirtbag. But during a church-sponsored project for a women’s shelter, he discovered that the dirtbag had a heart.
“My wife, a defense attorney, has a work colleague who is the biggest jerk you will ever meet. A blowhard who revels in winning at any cost and brags about the snarky things he does to really twist the knife. He’s known as a sharp legal mind, but I get the sense that he likes to try to screw weaker ADAs or other counselors and loves it when he catches them in some technicality. He makes all those stereotypes about lawyers seem valid.
My church had a sort of habitat for humanity-esque service weekend where we were rehabbing an old warehouse into a new space as a temporary women’s shelter for battered women. The offices were already up, but the individual rooms needed to be refloored, the bathrooms re-tiled, sheetrock needed to be hung and primed. To my surprise, I saw the [jerk] there with a toolbelt helping to install a sink.
Long story short, he donates his legal services to that one shelter– helping to set up restraining orders, divorces, custody, etc. for abused women trying to get away from their abusive partners/family.
At first, I wondered if this was some sort of court-ordered community service. It wouldn’t surprise me if he had done something to deserve it and then peeved off a judge somewhere. But no, the coordinator for the shelter who was working with my church says that he had been doing that for the past few years. Apparently, his wife’s previous husband was an abuser and he has a real heart for people in that situation.”