I forget who wrote it, or to whom s/he referred, but the gist was “she could have lived in quiet old age, rather than engaging herself in futile controversies.”

So could I. When I started blogging ten (count ’em, ten) years ago, I had already reached full retirement age. I was still able to enjoy practicing law, and had the long-desired luxury of being able to say “no” to a client or matter I didn’t want.

Not since my days as copy editor, and a sometime columnist and music reviewer, on the college newspaper had I given any thought to a journalistic sideline, much less a career. So when, at my daughter’s suggestion, I started blogging as an extension of my practice, I hardly intended it to become a second career.

Like Topsy, it “just growed.” Thus, the full realization that I had turned an unexpected corner wasn’t brought home to me until a fanatic’s attack in a foreign country shook me, and I wrote in my blogpost “Je Suis Charlie,” 1/9/15, “I am a journalist. The Cyber Age has made every blogger a journalist, quite as much as our colleagues of the hard copy and radio/television.”

So if my reaction to the Orders blackout on the new, improved (ya, you betcha), jim-dandy Tax Court website seems a bit much, it’s because we journos are getting hammered for telling the truth, especially to those who don’t want to hear it or read it or see it.

I need not find examples from Malta, the People’s Republic of China, or the Russian Federation. I need only look at my own country, my own city, to find plenty.

As I wrote in 2015, “This being a non-political blog, I did not want to jump into a fray that I can fight elsewhere. And that we all should fight, wherever and whenever.

“The matter here, however, transcends politics. I want to add my voice in this place to ‘Je Suis Charlie’.”

So, instead of living in quiet old age, I will now embitter my life with futile controversies. Because I never much cared for living in quiet old age.