Random Law School Update 18

Location: Washington, DC

I want to start by shamelessly congratulating myself for getting through finals. I feel pretty badass right now. People rarely describe law school as being badass. But let me tell you. Law school is the epitome of badass. The problem is that law students tend not to sell it right, probably in part because you cant really talk about law school to non-law school people without seeming nerdy or square, the opposite of badass. If you chop a brick with your forehead, you look badass. If you jump a 6-foot ditch, you look badass. If you dive off a cliff with just a squirrel suit on you look badass. If you scale a 12-story building without rope, people will definitely think that you’re badass. Law school is just like all of these things. It is nerve-wracking, adrenaline-pumping, really difficult, scary as f*ck, and a little bit stupid. But no one thinks of writing a 17-page essay response to 8 pages worth of riddle-like fact patterns based on 700 pages of dense readings under intense time constrains as badass. But, it is. And I can tell you, there are people here, at my school, in my classes who write 27 page responses in 3 hours AND get it all right. And yes, those people are badass. And while I am obligated to despise them for their curve-setting ways, I can’t help but appreciate their badassness. Go you.

I’ve mentioned this before. Law school, school in general, inspires me a lot. Something about forcing my brain to absorb a lot of dense subject matter makes it all the more thirsty for the lighter stuff. The more intense law school gets, the more I find myself conducting meta-analyzes of life, being, existing, loving, hating, wanting, growing, searching, finding, and thinking in general. That, and a lot of pleasant pithy things.

In the middle of studying, I thought it would be a nice idea to keep track of all the little things that go through my mind while I study for finals. My note reads:

“Random notes finals Fall 2010: 1. Law school is hard.”

And then I realized that writing random notes is distracting and decided not to write anymore notes until finals ended. Which describes a tragic paradox. The deeper into law school I get, the more crazy, random, brilliant thoughts my brain uncovers. At the same time, the deeper I get into law school, the less time I can justify to spend writing them down. So my most interesting wonderful epiphanic thoughts are left to come and go. Never to be recorded or reflected upon to their full potential. There is always the promise that I will write them all down after finals. But, my post-finals brain is useless for anything. Despite having a list of about 26 things that I had planned to do this week, I woke up this morning (read 12:30pm) wondering what in the world I am supposed to be doing. I proceeded to get on facebook and read status updates. (Turns out that was actually one of the things on my list.)

I had a million other things to say, but, I have forgotten most of them and have to go focus on celebrating now anyways. Ah, and I just remembered that I have been looking forward to reading and replying to your emails in response to my last two updates. This I will do very soon.

Love,

Melissa