© 2017 The Texas Lawbook.
By Hillary H. Holmes of Gibson Dunn
I was three years old when my mother started law school, so I can’t say I remember the event clearly. I do remember that she treated law school like a job and worked very hard as a young associate. She would come home to fix dinner and put my younger sister, Ashley, and me to bed by 8PM. After that, she would close the dining room door and study or work for three hours. On Saturdays, our dad would take us hiking or canoeing so that she could work. When she graduated from the University of Houston Law Center in 1983, Mom let me sit on her lap at her swearing in ceremony in Austin. So I guess you could say I grew up with the lawyer life as part of my earliest childhood experiences.
Mom was a public finance lawyer during her long career at Vinson & Elkins. Debt offerings of public securities happen when the market is favorable. As a result, her schedule was heavy and hard to predict. I had to learn to be an independent person and to do things on my own. Sometimes I missed having her available to me, but I knew that what she was doing was important for our family’s future. She represented a lot of health systems, and when we drove through the Texas Medical Center, she would point to a building and say with excitement, “Mommy helped finance that building, girls. You can do anything you want to do.” I realized that, if I worked hard enough, I could do big and important work that I enjoyed and that made a difference in the community.
During law school, I interned at the traditional Texas-based law firms. More than once, the partners took me to the closing of billion dollar financings where my mother was the counsel on the other side of the deal. I realized that Houston is a small world with very big opportunities. Relationships, excellent performance and outstanding reputation for client service are the most valuable assets one can have. Ultimately, taking pleasure in making a client’s life better or helping them achieve their goals is the key to happiness in this demanding profession. My mother’s strong example in these areas are a large part of why I became a lawyer.
Mom continues to support my career today. When I recently decided to leave one of those traditional Texas-based law firms with five of my partners to start the Houston office of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, a premier international law firm whose presence in Texas had previously been limited to its Dallas office, I sought her advice. When she was my age, opportunities in the legal profession were limited within the Houston legal community, perhaps more so for women. I told her how excited I was to have access to a wide range of resources (from elite talent to thought leadership) and to build something special – something founded on the basic premise of the highest quality legal work with a commitment to client service. Mom asked me one question – Is your law practice at Gibson Dunn better for your clients? If so, she said, I know you will be happy and that you are doing the best thing for your career. She was right.
I am a working mother, just like Mom, and I could not do it without her. I have two wonderful little boys, Jack, age 8, and Luke, age 4. They love going to GiGi’s house and can always stay there when my lawyer husband and I are out of town or have client obligations. Since retirement, Mom has not stopped growing. She wrote a novel that will be published later this year and is perfecting her golf game. She continues to inspire me to work hard at what I love doing and to continuously improve.
My mother’s mother (who is 93 and still rakes her own leaves) likes to say, “Just keep moving, working hard and being positive, and you will live a long and productive life.” My mother and I are both following her lead.
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