Cameron Michael Fathauer

There are moments in life when you see the hands of someone else at work.

Take today, for example. I received an email with a case number in the header—no party names, no signature line. I didn’t even know which court it was from. I asked the sender and figured out the case. Then the sender asked if I was on my way to a hearing for a completely separate matter that somehow slipped my calendar! I looked it up, printed the legal notice we needed, and moved quickly.

Unlike most days, I chose to not wear a full suit to work. I had on a nice sweater with a white collared shirt underneath. I’m trying to get the most out of my sweaters before winter’s over. No tie on. Yet all attorneys know: You wear a tie for court. And this is where it gets even more interesting.

Just yesterday—not last week, not last month, but the day before I had to run to court without a tie—I happened to notice a tie rack sitting not too far from my desk for what I believe was the very first time. Whether it was new or had always been there, I genuinely can’t say. But I had never registered it before that moment. I assume Matt Schad, my employer, friend, and mentor, had set it up at some point. Whatever the case, there it was. I grabbed what I could make work, fastened it around my neck, and ran out to my car with the notice in hand.

I wasn’t too stressed. The courthouse was only a block or two away, the case was non-adversarial, and the judge had kindly given me an extra ten minutes. When I showed up, notice in hand, she granted my order relatively quickly. Then the same assistant who had emailed me that morning asked about the other case—the one she’d originally contacted me about. I explained that someone at the office had accidentally filed that petition in the wrong court and I was planning to transfer it. But the judge said she could actually hear that kind of case, and we went ahead and scheduled the hearing on the spot.

I’m sharing this because someone else was clearly moving things together—and I want you to see exactly how.

In the span of 30 minutes: I didn’t miss a court hearing that had fallen off my calendar (and I wore a tie to said court hearing). The judge granted the order we needed. And we got a hearing scheduled on a completely separate case, saving me from filing a stack of paperwork to “correct” what everyone thought was a mistake. Three to four birds with just one stone—and I didn’t even throw it!

My assistant Sandy told me she’s never misfiled something like that before. But her “mistake” led to some of the most productive 30 minutes of my legal career so far. And a tie rack I’d never once noticed in however long it had been sitting there was waiting for me the morning I needed it most.

There’s a way of moving through life where you’re always trying to get on the screen—managing outcomes, controlling the narrative, making sure your name is in the right place. And then there’s the life where you’ve learned to sit in the seats and watch. In Saving the Subject, I describe my recovery as that second kind of life: “My life, since the accident, has felt like I have been in a movie theater, watching all these amazing things happen.”

The analogy gets at something simple but easy to forget: some of us spend our lives trying to be on the screen, and some of us are content to sit in the seats. I think the Christian life is about learning to get off the screen and into the seats—to recognize who’s actually in control and to submit to his authority. Proverbs 16:9 puts it plainly: “The heart of a man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.” And Proverbs 16:33: “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.”

Today was a good reminder. I drove back to the office in a borrowed tie, with a granted order and a scheduled hearing I hadn’t walked in expecting. Sandy’s mistake on the paperwork. A tie rack I’d somehow never seen. Thirty minutes in a courthouse a block from my office. The beginning was never mine. The end isn’t either.

(Written February 19, 2026)