“Learn to do right; seek justice, relieve the oppressed and correct the oppressor; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow.”
~ Isaiah 1:17 (Amp)
“To live fully, we must have dreams.”
~ Tom Parker, columnist, Blue Rapids, Kansas
Today is Saturday, May 14th, 2005; a day Keen has dreamt about for more than twenty years and worked towards for the last six and a half years.
Today is Keen’s graduation day.
The fog is thick outside my window, symbolizing how little any of us can claim to know about our future. The Bible tells us not to say, “I will go to this city and start a business and make a profit," but instead to say: “If the Lord wills, I will go to this city and set up a business and make a profit.” Therefore, Keen can say, if the Lord wills, then he will pass the bar exam on his first attempt, and if the Lord wills he will set up a private law practice in Topeka. Beyond that, we really can’t say.
But as Keen’s wife, I can say that I am so very proud of him and so very happy for him. I have watched him get up at 2:00 in the morning on bitter cold winter nights to warm up his trash truck. I have watched him don layers and layers of clothing in an attempt to protect himself from the elements as he hung off the back end of the trash truck, jumping up and down and running back and forth from the curb hauling heavy bags or cans of trash. I saw him repeat this process for nearly eighteen years, relying on God to help him through every mechanical breakdown and physical difficulty. Then I watched him dig so deep into his limited reservoir to somehow find the strength to wrestle with his four boys on the floor at night. I watched him find time – make time – to be a very present father to them. He took them swimming and camping and fishing. One time, while we were all camping at Council Grove, he took Jared and Josh canoeing. Keener was a baby, so he and I stayed back at the campsite. After quite a bit of time had passed, I began to worry. Then I saw Keen and my two young sons, ages six and four, trekking towards the campsite in their cut off jeans and t-shirts. The winds had picked up while they were out on the water and they ended up across the lake on the opposite shore, forcing them to hike back. Keen told the boys it was “Daddy’s Saturday Adventure.”
I have also witnessed the times when Keen was so weary and overwhelmed that he didn’t think he could make it one more day. This entry in my journal from 1994 depicts one of those times:
May 30, 1994 (12:30 a.m.)
I forgot to write about what happened last Monday, May 23rd. Keen just broke down. The water pump in the trash truck went out last Friday. The part had to be flown in and the repair could not be made until Monday. This meant that Keen could not run his Sunday night route, which put a lot of stress on him. He had to hope the part would come in on time and that the mechanics could fix it right away. Then he had to head out on his route and get everyone picked up. We had several calls about trash overflowing. It’s amazing – people must set their clocks by him because if he’s even a little late then they are on the phone wondering where he is.
On Monday morning Keen was at the kitchen table with his coffee and I left to take Kirk to Janie’s house [his babysitter], so that I could drive him to Topeka to pick up his truck. When I got back, I looked at him and he was just frozen and numb – like a zombie. Then his lips pursed in such a sad, sad way – almost like a small child’s pout. Then he began to cry and cry; the tears streamed down his face. I just reached out to hold him and cried with him. It was so sad.
I wrote down what he said. “I just don’t want another fight, another battle, another long day and that’s all I’ve got in front of me. I just can’t pick it up anymore. It’s just too heavy.” Then he cried some more. I held him and comforted him and cried with him. It broke my heart to see this God-fearing, hard working, loving father and husband so broken – so overwhelmed by his responsibilities. But I believe God will promote him one day. In fact just the night before he told [his good friend] Quentin, “I’ve never graduated from anything in my life, Quentin, and that’s always made me sad.” He believes God that he will graduate from something one day.
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Lastly, I have watched Keen struggle to make his dream a reality. For the past six years, he has worked diligently on his studies, endeavoring to do everything within his power to achieve his goals. College was not a nine-to-five proposition. Not unlike the trash business, school took nearly everything he had from sunup to sundown – and then some. Keen used to pray that one day God would allow him to make a living using his mind, instead of his back. Today, when Keen receives his law degree, that prayer will be answered.
In December 2001, after taking classes year around in an effort to complete a four-year degree in political science in three years, Keen was dealt a disappointing setback. One week after graduating from Kansas State, Keen learned that he had not been accepted into Washburn University School of Law. He was understandably devastated by the unexpected turn of events; but once again, he picked himself up by his bootstraps and set out to prepare himself to retake the LSAT test. He improved his score, reapplied, and was overjoyed to learn that he had been admitted to Washburn for the fall semester.
During the summer of his senior year at Kansas State, Keen was filling out applications for law school when he decided to sit down and attempt to capture his feelings about exactly why he wanted to become a lawyer. I’d like to close by sharing the result of that exercise:
Why I Want to Become a Lawyer
By Keen A. Umbehr
July 13, 2001
I want to fight injustice. Not from afar, but up close. I want to get in the ring, where the fight is actually taking place. I can't rest until I'm involved in a controversy; a controversy that affects peoples’ lives.
I have to be where the heat is. I have to be where battles, lives and reputations are won and lost. I must be a part of the process where history is made. I must be a part of the history that shapes the future.
I am my brother's keeper. I am sure that I am morally obligated and chosen to fight for those who have no limbs, to run for those who have no feet, to die for those who haven't lived yet.
But only in the chambers of justice can injustice be fought and then, only by the chosen few. Who among us will stand and fight? Who will sacrifice his life for the accused? Who wants to even the score?
Me.
Why will I go? For money? No. Money never made a dying man less afraid seeing his end. Then for fame? Never. All the fame in the world will one day fade so that few will even remember your name or what you did.
No, I must become a lawyer for honor; to complete a life's unquenchable thirst. To test my courage when faced with certain defeat; to absorb it, transform it and cast it back with such fury and force that it shocks the conscience of arrogant barristers.
I must do the very thing that shortens my life. For what is a life good for if not to be sacrificed for a cause?
The stress, the strain, the tremendous expense of the soul is what I acknowledge. I must be a lawyer so I can die satisfied, a man who used his life for noble causes.
A poet must express himself in poems, an artist on canvas, a soldier on the battlefield, and I, in a court of law. The hardships I will endure; the chaos and strain I will bear the burden of, but just let me in. Let me fight for you. Choose me to go in your place.
Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: “Whom shall I send, And who will go for Us?” Then I said, "Here am I! Send me."
~ Isaiah 6:8 (NKJV)
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