Due to an unforeseen computer malfunction, I recently found myself at the office without use of my computer for about an hour.  As I looked over my to-do list, I was struck by a feeling of utter helplessness as I tried to figure out which tasks I could attack without the use of a computer.  Quickly realizing that the answer was none of them, I pulled from my drawer an ancient relic of lawyering past …the dictaphone.

I was given a tape recorder dictaphone when I first started at my firm and was told that I was welcome to use it to dictate letters, motions, memoranda and the like.  At the time, it fell somewhere between the mimeograph and manual shepherdizing on the Lawyers’ Scale of Antiquation.  I put it in my drawer with those tiny tapes and forgot about it.  But as I sat at my desk waiting for my computer to be fixed, I realized that my dictaphone might be the only way to get any work done, so I pulled it out of the drawer.

I re-familiarized myself with the workings of a cassette recorder because I have not operated one since the last time I listened to Weird Al Yankovic.  I quickly realized that this lost art is a skill.  In the computer age of ctrl-c and ctrl-v, dictating a letter coherently, all the while speaking your punctuation, proved more difficult than I anticipated, and this was just an update letter to my client.  I thought about the stories of partners dictating motions and appellate briefs, and I gained a newfound appreciation for this long-lost talent.

Ultimately, I finished my letter and it only took three times longer than if I had typed it myself, a billing entry I am sure my client will appreciate.  Shortly thereafter, my computer was fixed.  After logging on, I clicked that little “W” icon on my Start menu’s Quicklaunch bar and felt a strange sense of relief.  I enjoyed my brief foray into dictation and my opportunity to consider my chosen profession’s digital history.  Unfortunately, I do not think it will be something I try again any time soon. Now, if I could only find a legal assistant who knows how to take dictation…

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