Attorney James Fields seems to have a quick joke for early everything. Take, for example, his age. Having just turned 58, Fields makes a crack about the health issues he’s overcome, including quintuple bypass surgery in January of this year. “The really bad year was 40. That was when my warranty ran out,” he says, a smile spreading across his face.
Heart surgery is no laughing matter, though, so Fields is taking his recovery seriously. Since January, he’s lost 30 pounds, is watching what he eats and is trying to be more physically active – as his schedule allows.
Fields has been a solo practitioner since 1995. For a good chunk of that time, he primarily did creditor’s work, representing banks and other clients in state court and bankruptcy court litigation. Changes to the bankruptcy code in 2005 forced Fields to retool his practice, and since then, he’s developed more of a general practice, doing, as he says, “pretty much anything that lends itself to being a lawyer.”
“I enjoy being my own boss. If you don’t make it on your own, you have only yourself to blame,” he says. Fields isn’t joking, so there’s no smile, although he does add, “Things are going okay. My bills are paid, there’s a roof over my head and I haven’t gone hungry.”
That wasn’t exactly a zinger, either, so Fields returns to form as he talks about his decision as a young man to become a lawyer. While he was growing up, sans his father, his mother moved a lot, taking her son from Mississippi, to Michigan, to Tennessee. They finally put down roots in Union City, where Fields graduated from high school and decided to join the Navy.
Why the Navy?
“Have you been to Union City?”
Fields is just getting started.
“We couldn’t afford for me to go to college. Plus, my grades weren’t all that great. In high school, I was in the half of the class that made the top half possible.”
Fields laughs. Clearly, he’s told that joke before, but it’s a good one. And he can crack wise about his early shortcomings because he more than made up for them in the years that followed. While in the Navy, he served as a radioman, second-class, and spent part of his time at a naval air facility in Sicily. When Fields completed his military service in 1978, he returned home to Union City and earned a public administration degree, with honors, at the University of Tennessee at Martin.
While an undergraduate student, Fields interned with the National Labor Relations Board. The organization offered him a job, but he decided to pursue his interest in becoming an attorney. Freshly married, he and his wife, Pam, packed their things and moved to Memphis, where Fields attended what was then called the Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law. He did exceedingly well, making Law Review, joining the editorial board for Law Review his third year, and basically becoming a part of the class that made the lower majority possible.
At the end of law school, an offer from a Chattanooga firm was waiting for him. He took it, and for ten years, worked at a handful of practices before striking out on his own.
Although a legal workhorse of high integrity and with a solid reputation, Fields’ days do not begin and end at his firm on Mountain Creek Road. In addition to assisting his clients, Fields teaches at the University of Phoenix, is serving as the county commissioner for District 2, and is an avid community volunteer. In fact, if one thing defines Fields more than being a lawyer, it would be his unpaid work.
A number of local nonprofit organizations have benefitted from Fields’ participation, including what is now known as Hope for the Inner City. When the agency was called Inner-City Ministries, Fields served on its board for over a decade. He’s also been an active member of several boards that oversee activities in which his two daughters have taken part, including the Signal Mountain Soccer League, the Chattanooga Pony Club, the Chattanooga Ballet and more. He served as president of the SMSL for three years. Currently, he’s a member of the Lion’s Club.
Fields focuses most of his volunteer efforts on his place of worship, Signal Mountain Presbyterian Church. In addition to serving on a number of committees, he’s been on the board of deacons and been an elder. “When I was going through my medical issues, the people of our church were there for my wife and me. Now we, in turn, want to minister to them,” he says.
Given everything Fields has on his plate, he laughs at the idea of having spare time. However, he does profess a love for classic movies and television series, particularly “Twelve O’clock High,” a drama set during World War II and aired by ABC in the mid-1960s, and “Combat,” another ‘60s series set during that Second World War that followed a frontline American infantry squad as they battled their way across Europe. “I don’t have hobbies, and I don’t hunt or fish, but I really like old movies and TV shows,” he says.
Fields is glad he became an attorney. He says law school taught him “a way of looking at things,” and he says he’s learned there’s never only one solution to a problem. “The challenge is in finding the solution that’s most beneficial to your client. The law is an interesting profession because it’s never boring. Every situation has nuances that make it unique and keep you thinking. It makes life interesting,” he says.
So does spreading a little humor here and there. “I joke a lot and I don’t take myself too seriously. What can I say? I like to laugh. It helps to approach problems from an objective standpoint. What’s the goal, and how can we get there with the least amount of friction?”
Laughing certainly helps, and no matter what Fields says about his health, the warranty on his humor will likely never expire.