Elena Kaplan, Atlanta Attorney

Yeah, that's me, maybe a year or two before my daughter Elena was born. Her mom, Stephanie, and I were still married. She made that shirt for me. I think they called that a Nehru collar, and love beads were in fashion. The only grey hair that I had was a dime size circle in my left sideburn, probably where the dimple was when I was little. Wow,I had a big head, and when I was being born the doc had to pull me out with forceps, leaving a dimple on each side. I guess it caused some damage, at least on one side, because when my sideburns started to grow in at 18 or 19 there was that little patch of grey.

Stephanie took this picture of me in our back yard. Judging by the angle she probably used the Minolta Autocord, a camera best used at waist level.

There's an old Jewish custom. When a child is a complete dissapointment, marries out of the faith, whatever, you go through a period of mourning as if they were dead, a seven day period called sitting shivah. It helps to bring finality to your feelings for this person. Time to move on with life for the living.

About six or seven years ago I was planning on driving up to Gainesville for a few days to visit Elena. She had gone back to school to pick up a masters degree in tax law. She was already an attorney in Atlanta. I'd visited her there a year earlier We talked on the phone all the time. Then I got The Letter. She wrote that she never wanted to see or speak to me again for the rest of her life. I tried calling her but she wouldn't talk. I tied calling her mother. She said to give her two or three months. She'd get over it. She didn't. Now it's been six or seven years.

I decided to just enjoy the memories of the good times we'd shared and accept the fact that she was gone from my life. I'm amazed at how many men that I know that have the same situation with their daughters, but not with their sons.

Broken Promises

Elena Kaplan



AssociateAtlanta Tel: 1.404.581.8653Fax: 1.404.581.8330Email: ekaplan@jonesday.com
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Employee Benefits & Executive Compensation
Elena Kaplan advises clients on benefits and compensation matters, including health and welfare benefits, qualified retirement plans, nonqualified deferred compensation plans, and severance. She assists clients with plan design, implementation, and compliance with applicable laws, including ERISA and the Internal Revenue Code.
Elena currently serves on the State Bar of Georgia's Executive Committee and served as president of the Young Lawyers Division of the State Bar of Georgia in 2007-2008. Elena has been selected as one of "Georgia Super Lawyers Rising Stars" four times.
AdmittedGeorgia
EducationUniversity of Virginia (B.A. in Drama [Costume Design] 1993); American University (J.D. summa cum laude 1998); University of Florida (LL.M. in Tax 2002)

Elena Kaplan ~ Politics In Her Blood

When my daughter Elena was young she always wanted to go everyplace with me. She never called me "Father", nor would she use the familiar "Al" like my friends did. To her I was always "Alan".

One day when she was about 5 or 6 President Jimmy Carter was speaking here in North Miami at the community center, and Elena went with me. I remember that the Secret Service guys really examined one of my Leica bodies that was equipped with a Visoflex II reflex housing and a big fat 150mm f/2.3 Astro Pan Tachar lens. I guess that if it didn't look like a Nikon F it MUST be a weapon. Anyway, after removing the lens from the Visoflex and letting them look through it, they let me use it.

Motion picture lenses, like the Astro Pan Tachar, have the smoothest bokeh, so a cut from using one lens to another is less jarring on screen. The shot of Carter was with that lens. Out of focus in the background is Mayor Howard Neu. The shot of Elena was from her campagn website when she ran for district 58 in the Georgia House of Representatives. I have no idea who shot it bu I like the photo.

After Carter finished speaking he posed for the typical shaking hands shots with about anybody who wanted to, but this was a few years before I decided that I may as well get a shot with me too. One person Carter did want to get a shot with was Elena. He got down on one knee and beckoned her to come sit on his other knee. She had a thing about grey haired older men. She didn't want anything to do with them. She was truely terrified! Try as we might we couldn't convince her to dry her tears and sit on Carter's knee. Here we are 30 years later and I bet she'd just love to have had a picture of Jimmy Carter and herself for her brochures and website in her run for a seat in the Georgia House of Representatives.