According to Murphy’s Law, if something can go wrong, it will.
But inside Zeringue & Associates Law Firm, Murphy’s Law has encountered a formidable opposing counsel.
Meet Isabelle Owens.
At 24, she is the firm’s youngest attorney, and her résumé speaks for itself: 33 college credits before finishing high school, undergraduate degree in three years, law school, and then the Louisiana Bar.
But the most remarkable thing about Isabelle is not what she has accomplished.
It may be the size of her heart.
The Case for Resilience
When I ask Isabelle to describe herself in one word, she hesitates.
“Maybe ... resilience?”
When I ask where that resilience comes from, her voice catches.
“It was watching my mom raise me.”
Her mother raised Isabelle alone while pursuing a nursing degree. Isabelle remembers sitting beside her in class, coloring skeletons in anatomy workbooks while her mother studied. Her grandmother, meanwhile, was pursuing a master’s degree.
Her mother continued her education as Isabelle entered college, modeling for her that growth never reaches a finish line.
Long before Isabelle knew the word resilience, she had watched it being lived.
“Quitting was never an option,” Isabelle says. “It was never an option.”
Dogged Persistence
That instinct shaped the lawyer Isabelle wanted to become.
“I wanted to make an impact, to help someone,” she says. “That’s why I became an attorney.”
That calling began at the Washington Parish Clerk of Court, where Isabelle often met people seeking protective orders. She knew what came next but could not give legal advice. “I can only give you the form,” she remembers saying, over and over. She wanted to offer more.
While classmates interviewed with large firms, Isabelle wanted something more personal.
“I want to actually see my clients,” she says. “I want to know who they are.”
Living in Mandeville, she Googled family-law attorneys and found Zara Zeringue. Zara had an opening, but Isabelle’s law-school schedule did not fit, so she waited.
Months later, sitting in a Business Associations class, Isabelle reached out again. She hit send, and this time, Zara said yes.
Life on the Other Side
Today, Isabelle works primarily with family and custody matters, where plans often break.
“Delivering hard truths is definitely one of the more difficult aspects of the job,” she says. “But I want people to leave knowing we really care about them, and that there is still hope.”
Hope, for Isabelle, is more than something she offers across a conference table. It’s something she’s needed herself. Her own life has taught her how quickly a plan can change.
Murphy, the dog who accompanied her from college into law school, was only two when a rare parasitic infection attacked his heart. By the time veterinarians discovered the cause, Isabelle says, his heart had become enormously enlarged.
Before anyone understood how sick Murphy was, Isabelle had adopted Curtis, hoping a companion might help.
Today, Curtis is waiting at home. A wedding with Garrett lies ahead. And across the table at Zeringue & Associates Law Firm sit people whose futures look brighter because of a 24-year-old who doesn’t know how to quit.
Murphy’s Law may get the first word, but Isabelle Owens reminds us that it doesn’t get the last.
“No matter what you’re going through today,” she says, “there is life on the other side of it.”
“It won’t always feel this way.”
Isabelle Owens is an associate attorney with Zeringue & Associates Law Firm, located at 527 E. Boston St., Suite 201, in Covington. For more information, call 985-801-0050, email zeringueoffice@lawyerincovington.com, or visit lawyerincovington.com.