I actually considered joining the navy. I went down to the recruiter’s office in Claremont, California, the college town where I was living. This was when the Sixth Fleet of the US Navy was based in Piraeus. I was infatuated with all things Greek, and I was very keen to get to Greece. I told them if they could promise me I’d be based in Athens, I’d join. But they couldn’t guarantee that, so that’s as far as that got. There were a lot of lawyers in my family, so I always had it in the back of my head that law might be an option.
I always thought I’d like to be a litigator. When I was at Cravath in New York, they really needed corporate associates, so they talked me into it. I found that a very valuable experience. But I had a young child, and I didn’t really understand how people raised families in New York. Obviously they do, but that’s not what I was used to; I’m from Utah – wide open spaces and mountains. And I’d enjoyed my time in Los Angeles, where I had gone to college. So after two and a half years I moved back there to join a very small firm that has long since disappeared, with a Cravath alumnus, a guy named Bob Baker, who I’d been told was a really good lawyer.