-every law student ever
And a Happy happy hour to you all. I am writing to you from the comfort of my couch, drinking a Guinness Extra Stout, watching a SyFy (is anyone else irrationally pissed they changed it from SciFi?) showing of Serenity, and shooing away my 3 month-old Alaskan Malamute puppy from biting at my extremities. Thanks to my only Friday class being cancelled tomorrow, I am officially finished with my second week of law school. It's been about a month and a half since my return from Spain, and the month between my return to the good old US of A -- and the end of my leisurely life as I know it -- was a pretty wonderful opportunity for me to do nothing except settle into the new place (it's awesome, by the way), go for daily runs, and raise/train my new puppy. Despite my somewhat lackadaisical approach to training, our smart little monster now knows basic commands and seems pretty much house trained. Success. She's also a cute little bugger.
I can has your soul?
By now, obviously, I'm an official law student. As a preface to the next few (years of) blog posts, I've never met an attorney who didn't tell me they hated their first semester of law school, but didn't end up loving the experience in the long run. I definitely need to make some readjustments to my life now that I am a professional student again: mainly, remembering what it's like to sacrifice sleep to complete excessive reading, having assignments hang over my head at night and on weekends, and just really holding in the contempt for classmates that habitually make asinine and self-important comments in each class. Ideally, I'd like to post something at the end of every week that summarizes my reflections on law school; possibly something interesting I've learned, something unintentionally hilarious I've overheard, or just something messed up about the process of the study and practice of law. My thought for this week is: I'm really happy red wine exists. After a day of being hyper-caffinated to get through a straight 9:00-3:30 class schedule, and the previous night's infinite reading, red wine is my happy juice that makes everything ok when I come home. Maybe in a few weeks I can advance to meditation or exercise to wash my weary soul...but for now, red red wine, you make me feel so fine.
I've heard it described that the first few weeks of law school are like swimming in the middle of the ocean at midnight: you have no idea where you are, how to get to place of safety, or how long you can go on before you feel like you drown. Perhaps this analogy is a bit melodramatic, but for the first few days, it feels apropos enough to describe the unbelievable helplessness that comes with being surrounded by geniuses who can read and reason better than you after reading the most dense material ever put in front of you. Again, probably melodramatic. But lawyers are a whiney bunch. I'm pretty sure the profession only exists because, as a group, we can't deal with math or hard science. But we sure do talk good.
I think my biggest beef with law school is that I feel like I have no purpose. Sure, I'm apparently learning a valuable skill to be a part of a licensed profession...but I miss the sense that I'm actually doing anything with my life. I feel a little bit useless. I know this feeling will pass once I get the basics down and can work in legal clinics and specialize in a field where I can do some good...but I think for now I feel like I'm doing the same thing as thousands of other first year law students (reading old cases without knowing entirely what to glean from them), and don't feel like I'm contributing anything to society other than the future dividend to graduate student loan lenders.
I hope my (intended) weekly posts about the quirky experiences of law school will give you some joy, and that in my reflection, I can remember that I'm getting some joy out of all of this as well.
Love to you all!
A-bear
P.S. GEAUX SAINTS!!! The networks don't broadcast the games up here (those heathens), so I found a sports bar in our neighborhood that shows all Saints games. Looking forward to the Carolina game this weekend!
