Twenty Years in the Trenches an Anniversary Celebration

by Ruth Roberts

The Day was as bright and hard as a diamond, and filled with tiny sparks of ice, like confetti in the morning sun. It was a day much like my first Christmas in Canada, and it felt like all my Christmases, rolled into one. I was middle-aged, dressed in my brand-new robes, and about to be called to the Bar. It was twenty years ago, and the memory of that day is as bright and fresh and wonderful to me as ever.


I went to law school later in life. I left school at 16, too bored with the rules, too curious about the world, too anxious to get started on life to spend another moment in the musty halls. I suspect my teachers were as happy with my decision as I was: I was a very square peg in the round holes of boarding school. Churchill is quoted as having said that he didn’t go through school, he went under it. We would have been soul mates, he and I. And I stepped out of my school uniform and into the World, and started my adventures. And there was always another adventure calling me: write for a newspaper, work in Yellowknife, become a Mum, step into politics and out again – always a cause to fight for, always a project to champion, always something to attract the attention of my magpie mind. And somehow there was always the right person strolling into my life at the right time, showing me the opportunity to try something I never might have dreamed of. Which is how I chanced on law, and began a love affair that still burns bright. I met someone in the course of work, who thought I would be suited to law, who encouraged and pushed and challenged me, who convinced me I could do it, when I really wasn’t sure that I could.

I wrote the Law School Aptitude test. I applied to law school as a mature student, without an undergraduate degree. I was interviewed at Osgoode Hall Law School, and the day I received the telephone call telling me I had been accepted was the day my life changed forever.

It wasn’t easy. I went under school, not through it, remember? I had to learn how to learn. But I had wonderful mentors and teachers, amazing family and friends, who cheered me on, dried my tears, and helped me every step of the way. And in second year of law school, criminal defence law sidled up to me, with the smile of a guileless child, tapped me on the shoulder and said: “you are going to be mine.” And I was. And I am.

Make no mistake about it, criminal defence law is a tough profession. That sparkling February day lead me to some of the best days of my life. But it also lead me to some of the worst. The victories are hard-won, and taste of Summer. The defeats are hard, lying in the mouth like ashes. For all of us who serve our Mistress, Law, there are plenty of sleepless nights and wet mornings of the soul. We suffer with our clients and their families, we battle against the resources of a sometimes relentless State, we are stoic in the face of public criticism of what we do. But we are constantly aware that, in the words of my highly esteemed colleague Marie Heinen, it is our job to challenge the status quo. And we relish that. And there are so many moments of joy. The joy of working with colleagues with sharp minds and ready wits, the pleasure of working with our clients, and knowing that we really do make a difference, sometimes even if its only in the small ways we help. The joy of doing something that is fundamentally important in the protection of our rights and civil liberties.

On that February morning, my name was called, and I walked across the stage at Roy Thompson Hall, and officially became a lawyer. I could not believe my good fortune. The Oath I took that day resonated deep in me, like a bell calling me to service. It resonates still.

Here’s to the next 20 years!

Ruth Roberts
February 20, 2019