Where did you attend college and what did you study?
I graduated from the University of Virginia in 1993 with a Bachelor of Arts in Classics. Choosing that major was an easy decision, as I loved Greek and Latin (Latin in particular) and had the best instruction imaginable at Prep. Father Nicola drilled his young charges in the fundamentals of Second Year Latin, preparing us for the sweet and holy brilliance of Father Byrne (read WJS article A Priest Finds Serenity in Humor) in Third and Fourth Year Latin. After graduation, I attended the University of Virginia School of Law, graduating with a law degree in 1996. Latin is a highly organized and rules-based language, so it turned out to be great preparation for the rigors of law school. Inasmuch as the Vatican wasn’t active in the market for U.S. lawyers with a Classics background when I graduated, I went into private practice, where I’ve remained since.  
 
What do you do for work now?
I am a partner with Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP, an international law firm, and I work out of our Charlotte, North Carolina office. As Prep did a decade earlier, Hunton took a chance on me in 1996, and I’ve remained happy there ever since, loving the work I do and the colleagues with whom I do it. I work in leveraged finance and trading with a specialization in distressed debt transactions. I spend a fair amount of time in New York, but Charlotte is my home and a great one for my family and me. I’m also the head of the firm’s Capital Finance & Real Estate Team.  
 
Share a favorite Prep tradition or memory.
There are too many to count, and rather than state the obvious ones all Prep guys know, I’ll lean into the Classics a bit. Father Byrne stressed the importance of this line in Book One of Vergil’s “The Aeneid”: Forsan et haec olim meminisse iuvabit. It means “Someday it will be pleasing to recall even these things.” The point was that with time, you’ll look back and even hardships will be pleasant memories because they’ve made you who you are. I never forgot that lesson (Read WSJ article Someday We’ll All Look Back and Laugh), and can confirm from my vantage point that it’s true. Preparing for Dr. Ochs’ U.S. History class or Mr. Wisecarver’s dreaded “Sometimes True, Always True, Never True” Geometry tests, withstanding the withering gaze of Father Elliott in Spanish if unprepared, even running Coach Fraiture’s dreaded campus “perimeters” after soccer practice while still in cleats, all of this is nothing but pleasing to recall. I even love to eat Shepherd’s Pie, an unpopular South Room staple back in the 1980s!
 
What did your time at Prep mean to you?
Simply put, everything. Coming out of middle school, I was the proverbial fast-baller with control issues. Prep, which has specialized in breaking blooded colts for over two centuries, almost instantly figured out how to throw a saddle on me. The faculty directed my adolescent energies toward, first, the right temporal things (my education), and then the right eternal things (my relationship with God). Read WSJ article To All the Fathers in My Life, Thank You. It just occurred to me that the last thing I read at Prep as a student was on my graduation day in June of 1989, Prep’s bicentennial year. On the back of our commencement materials were written these words from Micah 6:8: “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God”. I cannot imagine a more succinctly beautiful way to be sent out into the world.  
 
How do you live out "men of faith, men for others" today?
 Writing is one way I try to live out my Faith and remain a man for others. I publish essays on the “F-Topics” - Faith, Family and Fellowship – every few weeks, with some less serious and simply Fun ones thrown in every now and then. Gifts are meant to be shared, and I feel fortunate to share such talents as were given me through writing. I do this by reminding readers anecdotally that while the world changes rapidly, what is True, Good and Beautiful – God – never does. If we love God with our whole heart and love our neighbor as ourselves, all will be well in this world and the next. I write with these thoughts foremost in mind, and always with a heart full of gratitude. None of the blessings in my life – a nice career, a loving wife, five wonderful children, countless pets, great friends, and a chance to stay connected to the greater world around me through writing - happen without Georgetown Prep. Not a single one. AMDG!