Law school. take 4.

Semester number 4 is about to commence. the time has arrived for reflection, resolution, revamping of my crusty old law school life. Spontaneity must replace routine. New experience, new friends, new outlets.
I remember being younger, and not understanding claustrophobia - how could a person really be afraid of an elevator? What could possibly be going on a person's head that would inspire such nonsensical dread? The same is law school. Except in law school, people actively try to force you to think you're in a box that gets smaller with each passing semester, and the doors close shut once you graduate from law school. I am the only one who can control my anxiety about going up the law school shaft. If I don't think about it, it doesn't exist - the fear, that is. But I already have. So there you go. But still, by actively reminding myself that I'm only in a box if I believe so much is true, I can leave open the doors, and come and go as I please. There may be some difficulty. There may be some wasted time, or money, or efforts. I'll end this thought on that note, lest I continue and start to sound trite, and recite little isms that I don't truly believe.

Nonetheless, resolutions for this year:

1. DO work only when I must, and don't dilly dally in the library unless it's necessary or for socialization purposes. Don't sit in the library reading blogs, checking emails, and wasting time that doesn't need to be spent indoors.

2. DO take time to cook and relax at the end of the day, even if I must return to work later that night.

3. DO write in your journal every morning, even if briefly.

4. DO make a point to go to different libraries more often, and branch out to non-law-student grad students.

5. DO one new thing each week. completely new. never done 'er before.

6. DON'T let your life become monotonous routine.

7. DON'T go through an entire week eating pb&j for lunch. it's certainly ok a couple times in a row.

8. DON'T stop going to see your therapist.

9. DON'T skip out on social engagements in favor of watching Law & Order SVU.

10. DON'T beat yourself up if you fuck up a little bit.

11. DO actively explore practice areas that appeal to you, including the following: Land Use, Appellate Advocacy, First Amendment law.

12. DO be supportive and available to friends.

13. DO loosen the F up once in a while.

14. DO enjoy semester #4.

jobless. help

Still jobless, and steal healing.

I went through a kind of crisis at the beginning of the year, when I realized that the whole big law thing was neither a shoe-in, nor a feasible option for an Ivy law student with a 3.34 GPA. Well perhaps for some, but for someone who no salient, distinguishing feature, not so much. But unlike I slipped into believing -albeit temporarily- that does not reflect my ability to be a great lawyer, to succeed in my career, to have a great second-year of law school.

Second-year is so much better than the first year. I'm really busy, maybe even more so than last year, but I get to do more things that I like doing - moot court, and writing, and journal editing work, and TA'ing. I also am thinking more about which classes I actually like, and what I want to do next summer. I really like appellate advocacy. I enjoy the pressure of being the target of a barrage of intense questioning, and forcing myself to think quickly and respond articulately, forcefully, intelligently. To some it comes natural, and to me it takes work, but I've gotten considerably better, and only become more inspired to keep improving.

The life of public service which I shunned for so many years, and decided so resolutely that I did not want, has started to seem like something of a calling for me. I can relate to anyone that I come across in life, and feel most satisfied when I improve someone else's situation - even if for just one day. So many sad and frustrating things happen to everyone, each day, and sometimes the only proper thing to do seems to be to try to ease the burden. Cancer surrounds my life. Took my father, struck my grandfather years ago, recently has befallen my youngish cousin, my good friend from high school, and now my other grandfather has throat cancer- the petty things, the concern with which firm, with how much, with all of it .... seems so trivial.

I'm not perfect. I'm not a saint, I don't do things from a completely selfless place, even when I help others. I do it because it makes me feel good too. But I do like listening to people. I do like living in a country where it's possible to make things better - more liveable, more hopeful- for others. I am not free of material desires, and I'm not a god-seeking person. I recognize that my generation is the "me" generation, consumed with themselves, and their photos, and their posts, and I'm a part of that generation. But the choice to rise above, and disconnect, seems almost more elitist than joining the masses, and sharing your pictures and yourself.

Anyway, these postings have barely any substance, mostly aimless blathering. I would write about more juicy things if I was remotely interested in any male counterparts at my law school, but I am not. Sucks. need to branch out to other schools... business guys?

mehhh..

job frenzy. the UGLY

I know this is old news now, but still somewhat new to me - this is ugly:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/06/ethan-haines-unemployed-l_n_673490.html

I mean, yes, I understand your frustration, understand your disillusionment with the whole law school process, which we expected would be sufficient to guarantee a high-paid job, at least high enough to start paying off those loans, understand your desire to want to make a public statement of outrage. Hunger strike though? A method relied upon by waify little monks protesting human rights violations, and you draw upon their techniques to protest your inability to land a big-firm job? A little self-indulgent.

More ugliness: friends turn-coating on friends. One classmate is apparently expressing his disbelief that his besty landed a summer associate spot at Cravath, when he had been sharing his notes with this friend all year, and how is it possible that he wasn't chosen and his friend was? There's something called being a graceful loser - I though we were supposed to learn this on the soccer field in elementary school, after a big loss, when as much as we wanted to spit in our hand and moosh it in our opponents' faces, we were forced to stay in the line, and shake the hand of each and every player, and force a grin. Maybe the country club allows you to stomp off without shaking any hands, and defame the other guy or gal...

To be fair, the "winners" haven't been much more gracious either. Like really, do you need to announce on facebook the airports you're passing through on callbacks, and the moment you accept a position from NYElite firm? Do you really need to complain about how this is so stressful, having to miss classes to be dined by prospective employers, while at the same time struggling to choose which employer deserves 10 of your precious summer weeks? Go blow it.

And this is the last ugly part: me, wanting to plug my ears while I reassess the direction I want to go in my life, and reevaluate why I want a firm job, and if it's merely a matter of getting caught in the waves of law school. I did NOT want to do that when I arrived here, so when did it become the most important thing in my life? Is it envy that's causing me to step away from my classmates and witness the events that are unrolling like a greek tragedy?? Or is there something truly disturbing to my core values when I see people suddenly start warming up to classmates with whom they hardly spoke last year, only after discovering that that person made law review, or just accepted an offer from Davis Polk....

It's ugly. It's a bloodbath that is revealing the worst in some of my classmates.

Job Fair

Fucking bullshit. Career services are a worthless collection of individuals. I prefer the cold hard truth right up front to an (finally) honest, post job fair conversation about Plan B - after having 17 interviews and receiving NO callbacks. Not fucking one. Maybe this is a strike from the legal overlords, punishing me for my hubris walking into those interviews. I really could not have imagined that it would be almost September and I would have not ONE callback interview. I know my grades are not stellar, but a double-ivy league education, federal clerkship experience this summer, and bilingualism, and still, not enough. Not to mention, I'm a good interviewer. I'm not an overly energetic cheerleader, but I definitely have solid people skills, and can slightly adjust to my interviewer's communication style. An interviewer even told me that I was a great candidate and he was sure I'd get several callbacks, but maybe their firm was not what I was looking for. This flamboyant interviewer, from BIG CITY NY law firm, a law firm that has upped their standards in an attempt to become another Cravath, even though they have decidedly brown shoe rep, who told me that a federal judge was probably hitting on me when he said that as a woman he trusted my opinion because women are so observant ... fucking jackass. I should threaten him with suit for such effrontery.

Such disillusionment. But hey, there are worse things, and I need to keep that in mind..

im looking down into the water and i see wiggly myself

whew. wheeeeeew. where has the last year gone? how much has changed in the last year. looking back I see myself as a quivering little undergrad when I embarked upon this whole thing. My main concern was whether I would enjoy the substance of the classes - an even greater preoccupation than the cold-calling, the job market, the reading, and all of the typical law concerns. Throughout the year I was so involved in studying and socializing when possible (drinking wine and hosting supper parties and the occasional booze-fueled college-esque long nights out) and planning out my summer that I did not have time to reflect on whether I was selling my soul for a comfortable apartment and truly delicious meals with bottles and bottles of wine and trips to Europe a couple times each year. Is that what I'm living for - to enjoy the bourgeois comforts and splurges that seem to adorn my facebook page? Do I work and dedicate myself to study just in order to have wonderful stories to tell and make others envious and satisfy my lust for travel and exotic experiences at a young age - an age when my parents were working nights to get by and raise their children? Well no. My studies are not fueled solely by material desires and adventurous yearnings. Note: I have roughed it during my travels as well - and come home black soled (my feets) and 10 pounds thinner from food poisoning from third-world countries ("you look great!" says my mom upon my return). I am intellectually captured my my field of study in many ways - I worry that these interests are fleeting and still nothing in particular is really screaming my name, in part because I am pulled in several different directions. Global business and human rights and free speech and the U.S. CONSTITUTION and clean technology and trial advocacy. All and none are completely enthralling. Here is the time to decide and here I am wavering and succeeding and looking inward and outward to figure out what interests me. That shouldn't be hard. What type of person is characterized by absolutely nothing? I loathe the idea of being a person that is unopinionated and complacent about her life and the way she spends her time. Certainly not about the company she keeps. Love people more and work fully and throw yourself into the world and don't think so much when you're walking around - don't walk around pensive and looking at the ground and thinking about how your father's alcoholism has led to your need for attention which led you to act the way you did last night at that party which was really not even a party and maybe you should have just stayed home and tried to finish that Russian novel you've been reading the past three weeks because really it's pathetic that in the course of the entire summer you've only read one full book and this was the summer you were supposed to learn to speak French and play the mandolin and seek out any possible opportunity to do some public speaking and not carelessly waste brain cells on pointless alcohol binges... look forward and observe the world around you and be involved in it at all times and ready to talk to strangers.

And here I am.

finals.

Rollercoaster. borderline insane. some days I wake up and feel pumped and ready for a 15 hour study day. some days i want to shoot myself in the face or just hop on a plane i-don't-care-where. fueling on large coffees. skin hates me. i hate territorial jurisdiction. all its intricate rules of self-restraint, and federal/state law questions, and long-arm statutes, and balancing interest standards, and power tests. ok, so i like it, but it's an immense beast that i can't even hop on for one second without it bucking me off like a paper doll. need. to. tame. the. beast.


i think i'm losing it.

stranger things

grad school + caffeine + MEMOS + summer job search + seeing Mr. Lawstudent in every single class = shingles. I mean, COME ON. Shingles? Really? Who gets shingles? How many people under 60 do you know who have contracted adult stress-induced chicken pox? And I thought I had this law school thing down pat. Thought I had figured out the ideal formula, for myself at least, balancing studying, and law school events, and socializing, and occasional weekend excursions, and job searching, and exercise, and breathing - mindful breathing... ohmmmm... but then one day I woke up and felt like someone punched me in the ribs. Writing it off as product of an awkward sleeping position, or perhaps a little over-exertion on the treadmill this week, I ignored it until these little red spots started, a small patch of 7 or 8, popped up on my right rib cage. It could be worse, honestly. Going from thinking I had a tumor, which turned out to be a swollen lymph node, to discovering I had adult chicken pox was actually a relief. Kind of funny even. It gives me an excuse to force myself to take "me time" and go to cafes and indulge in chocolate-almond-current slices with a decaf americano, and write to all of my many readers. All one of you, present party included. Anyway, my body is basically rejecting this maniacal work-mode and sending me signals that I need to take a minute after classes to chill out and breath before I get back to work. At the very least, I need to do it at times like now, when there are no pending memos, finals, or anything of the sort.

It makes me wonder whether the high-stress life-style of a lawyer is going to work for me. It's such a love-hate relationship. I love waking up each day with a goal and struggling to understand cases... well perhaps not the struggle, but that "click" when you realize that you get it. It's an incredibly nerdy, but incredibly rewarding feeling, when you're sitting in the library, and reading an opinion written by Justice Marshall in 1811, and for an instant you think to yourself, "I totally understand what you're saying right now," or, " I totally relate to where you're coming from, my brethren." And I hear Marshall responding, "Yes, sistren, I knew you'd understand." The classes I've taken so far have all been really interesting. One of the biggest realizations I've had during my first year of law school is how much the law permeates every aspect of life. Every. Aspect. Of. Your. Life. So it really is such a tool - you can have a conversation with anyone in the world, so long as you're not completely socially inept, a feature that is not uncommon in the legal field. Still, back to the career considerations, if I'm in a field where those who thrive in an unrelenting high-stress work atmosphere are the same ones that succeed, I'm not sure whether I want to throw myself into that ring. I do love the competitive atmosphere, and that push it gives. But for how long?

This will quickly turn into a rambling, soul-searching mess, so I'll focus on now. Getting through year 1 and continuing to make goals and focus on which areas interest me the most, intellectually. Focus on being healthy and remember to take my Valtrex (yup, that's the herpes meds) to treat the Shings. My friend is in dental school just quit cigarettes and caffeine and has been suffering panic attacks because he will be seeing patients soon. So let's not forget, the law isn't the only stressful field, and the point is to learn to see this stress as eustress (positive stress! the stuff that gives life SALSA!) not distress (negative stress! panic attacks).