by Glenn Tschimpke
Staff Writer
E. McRae “Mack” Mathis staggered out his motel room at the marina at Treasure Key in the Bahamas, clutching post after post until he made it to the office.
“I think we need a doctor,” he told the staff.
“There will not be a doctor here until Tuesday,” was the reply.
That was days away.
“You’ll either have to roll us out of the room or we’ll be back in the United States of America by Tuesday,” he shot back.
In the late 1980s, Mathis and his wife, Karen, had taken a few days off to let the wind blow through their hair and salt spray kiss their cheeks as they sailed from Jacksonville to the Bahamas. No children, no phone, no Global Positioning System.
“We had a blast because the only thing we had for navigation was a compass,” he said. “She’s from Missouri so she had to have a lot of confidence in my sailing skills, which really weren’t all that great. But I had studied what I needed to do and what kind of course I needed to set. You have to allow for the Gulf Stream, which is real strong down there.”
After docking overnight at an uninhabited island after the first day, the two sailed on to Treasure Key, where they were greeted by less than accommodating — but still friendly — locals. It was the off-season and they were perhaps a little tourist-weary. The got a room at the marina and settled into some dinner.
“They had two specials. One of them was battered lobster, which we got the first night and was excellent,” he remembered. “Then they had some kind of stuffed flounder. The mistake we made was, I think, what was the special the first night may have been the special for a while. On the night we got to it, we both got very, very ill. It was awful. It was all the descriptions you could give it and more. We were so weak. No phone in the room, we could not even get anywhere to even get some assistance.”
With no doctor on the horizon, Mathis grabbed some Sprites from his boat and shared them with Karen until the two were able to sail.
“By the next afternoon after that, we were out on smooth water,” he said. “It was pretty pleasant again and we got some food in us an we were feeling good again.”
Not all of Mathis’ travails threaten his well-being. As one of the newest judges in the Fourth Judicial Circuit, he tries to keep things toned down on the high seas, at home and at work.
A one-time prosecutor for the State Attorney’s Office, he made the decision to cross over to the judicial ranks after nearly a quarter century in law. Appointed to the bench by Gov. Jeb Bush in 1999, Mathis was assigned to the family law division where he wades through the sticky details of divorces, child custody and division of property. While it can be disheartening to watch couple after couple go their separate ways — each fighting over custody over the children — he tries to keep things positive, if only for himself.
“As a prosecutor, you get into court on criminal cases, it was sort of not-so-good people at their best,” he said. “Here [as a judge] it’s sort of decent people at their worst. It is really kind of troubling. But I do feel that rulings and adjudications at least kind of steer a little bit in the right direction. I don’t have any false impression that it’s made some great impact. A lot of time it can. But even then, I’m not so presumptuous to think I’m getting it right when I’m at the end of it every time because a lot of times you really don’t know.
“In family law, there are a lot of cases where there is no right answer or maybe there are two right answers. Maybe you could be right either way.
“If I can get it right,” he continued. “If I can make the right decision and believe the right person and truly determine what’s in the best interest of the child, then I can make more of a difference than just by overseeing or prosecuting cases. I could maybe make somebody’s life a little more positive or make things a little more stable.”
Now that he is a judge, Mathis is no stranger to being the voice for the community. Growing up in Perry, Fla., he was on the air of a local AM radio station by the time he was 14.
“Don’t get excited. It were three listeners and one was my mother,” he discounted.
With a lot of love but not a lot of money from his parents, Mathis earned his money for college as a disk jockey, manager at the University of Florida book store and other odd jobs. After graduating from Memphis State Law School, he came to Jacksonville and worked in the consumer affairs department of the City while he studied for the bar exam, which ultimately landed him a position as a young lawyer in the State Attorney’s Office.
Over the years, he’s seen his fair share of bizarre cases. As a prosecutor for the State Attorney’s Office, he had a hand in solving the infamous mouse in the Coors bottle case.
“The most fun part about that case was there was an autopsy conducted of the mouse,” he said. “The reason being — it makes sense when you think about it — we needed to determine how the mouse had died. Had he drowned? We needed to determine how long he had been in the state he was found in. All of that really refuted that it could have been at the Coors plant.”
Another case charged a funeral director with failing to bury bodies. Scores of cadavers were stacked up in a sealed room while the director pocketed the burial money.
Despite the macabre aspect his job has taken at times over the years, Mathis tries to keep a lighthearted approach after he clocks out for the day. Although an avid sailor in the past with Karen, his two sons, Eric and Alex, have taken the forefront. He sold his sailboat when he couldn’t justify keeping it for the amount of use it got, but still has fond memories of his times on the water.
(His wife is one of the city’s most visible people: she’s better known as Karen Brune Mathis, and she’s the senior business writer at The Florida Times-Union. She’s busy, but the two frequently meet for lunch at downtown spots.)
“Really, our most fun family times have been out on the water,” he related. “Even when they were in diapers, we would sail down to St. Augustine in the ocean. We would anchor off the fort and we would get there in time to watch the city light up in the evening. We grilled chicken and make some things on the little grill on the back of the boat.
“We’d read to the kids and they’d put on a little play for us,” he continued. “Then we’d get them settled in and sit back and just enjoy the evening and do some reading and stuff like that. That was just real relaxing — a real tension release thing.”
Still, maybe someday when the kids are grown and out of the house, there will be another boat. Maybe a trip up the Intracostal. Maybe when he retires. Maybe. Retirement is still a question mark for him.
“I haven’t really cemented that in as a part of a plan, yet,” he said. “I enjoy coming to work. I don’t come in early for any special one reason. And when the calendar is completed on a day when I have to do something, I won’t just sit on my hands and say, ‘I’m here.’”
The paradox of Mathis’ life is that by day, he sees families disintegrate. By night, he works to keep his strong.
“Our social agenda is really the four of us,” he said. “I go to some events and social activities, but it’s primarily good friends or people I’m close to. We just like spending time doing things all together because it won’t be too long before you won’t be able to do that.”