Making Things Light

My last classes of the semester will be on Tuesday. The sad part of that news is two of my favorite classes, Property Theory and Religious Clauses of the Constitution, will be over (I’m somewhere between ambivalent and glad regarding the end of my other classes). The good part is I’ll have plenty of time to tackle the research hours I need to complete by the end of the semester. I’ll be spending much of this week staring at my computer as I reformat citations and annotate law review articles.

Reviewing law articles can be a bit mind-numbing. The topics are frequently hair-splitting and obscure. (To be honest, it makes me feel a little like the biblical Pharisees of old.) I recently came across one professor who recognized the tendency toward minutiae in the law. He gave a false paper title as an example: “What’s Wrong with the Twenty-Ninth Exception to the Hearsay Rule and How the Addition of Three Words Can Correct the Problem.”* It’s a fantastic title; one which I wouldn’t actually be surprised to find in the database.

My Trust & Estates professor used to joke about this tendency as well. When someone asked a question to which he didn’t know the answer (for example, can you leave your possessions in trust to an unborn pet?), he would suggest the question was a good topic for a student “note” (the term used for a student legal research paper). “Note topic!” he’d say.

(“Note Topic!” is just waiting to become a party game for the niche lawyer market.)

I appreciate lawyers who can poke fun at themselves and the profession without being disparaging. Actually, I appreciate that ability in anyone. A member of my ward recently described it this way: he said his son is the type of person who does not make light of things, but makes things light. That, I think, is a mark of good humor and strength of character.

And that is why I hope I will always enjoy a good lawyer joke. (Feel free to send them my way.)

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*Richard Lempert, The New Evidence Scholarship: Analyzing the Process of Proof, 66 B.U. L. Rev. 439 (1986).

I found this little message as I was walking down DOG
Street the other day. Someone is very excited about
the state motto: "Virginia is for Lovers."

The spring weather has been beautiful.
This is the Christopher Wren building
on one of the many gorgeous days we've
had of late.

It's a little startling to pull up your blinds and find a
lizard. Especially when your windows haven't been
open in several months. Happily, this little guy
readily complied as I escorted him out the front door.

This tree gets by with a little help from a friend.
What makes me curious is how it survived sticking
out sideways like that long enough to get a post to
rest on. Or maybe someone just inserts a new
support post every few years. In any case, this seems
like a group portrait waiting to happen.

Registration and Other Sudden Events

My week began with registering for new classes. I don’t know how other schools do it, but here at the Marshall Wythe Law School, initial registration lasts about a minute. Imagine 200+ students all anxiously refreshing the registration website just before 8:00 in the morning, then frantically typing in class ID numbers in hopes of claiming a seat in the most popular courses before they’re filled up.

It’s a little ridiculous and more stressful than the situation warrants.

It was, however, nicer this year than last year. As a rising 3L, I was part of the first skirmish for classes (the 2Ls get to scrounge for what’s left the next day) and I only ended up on one wait list. First pick for the graduating class is some consolation for having less than 60 seconds to register.

Spring seems to have happened just as suddenly as registration this year. One day, the trees in general were still a collection of late winter brown sticks. The next day, there were little leaves poking out everywhere and the predominant landscape color was green. The trees still have a lot of growing to do before they completely obscure the view, but spring is in full flow.

The other indication of spring is the birds. I woke up the other day to a bird outside my window doing a pretty good impression of an alarm clock (in my mind, it was MY alarm clock – it might have been a mockingbird).

In other good news, my to do list for the rest of the semester now fits on one Post-it note. That is an unduly simplified image of the amount of work I have left, but it feels good to see it all in one compact list.

Four more weeks and then it will be summer. Whew.

Tender Mercies

I’ve learned why I’m not pursuing an MBA. One of my Business & Financial Literacy professors mentioned in class one day that, “this isn’t rocket science.” My mental response was, “I prefer rocket science.”

Business is not my forte.

I had inklings of this last semester in Business Associations, but this class has solidified my feelings. Too much business and not enough policy and theory for my tastes. I won’t be taking any more business classes.

On the positive side of my class schedule, I am very much enjoying Property Theory. In that class we get to discuss abstract ideas, competing theories, and phrases such as, “not sufficiently thing-like.”

On the research front, I’ve become so accustomed to electronic searches that I found myself automatically moving to press CTRL + F while I was reading a textbook the other day. Note to self: textbooks are not searchable.

I’ve also become semi-nocturnal, as far as research is concerned. I’ve done an over-large amount of research between 11 pm and 5 am this semester. This is the result of never settling into any semblance of a routine. (With only three weeks left before finals, at this point I don’t think a routine is going to happen.)

In parallel with my erratic schedule, school and life have been up and down the last little while, like rowing over rough waters. And about a week and a half ago, I was needing a hug from my mom. Unfortunately, that’s a little hard when your mom is 2,197 miles away (according to Google that’s 1 day and 9 hours of driving).

This is where the tender mercies of the Lord come in.

Over the last few months, my cousin Kristine was fighting osteosarcoma for the third time in her life. That meant surgery, chemotherapy, hospitalization, and stress and pressure and worry on her and those who love her most. After several months of fighting, Kristine learned there were more tumors, and they were inoperable.

When I start thinking law school is hard, I think of Kristine and I think that cancer is probably harder.

Kristine passed away shortly after learning her condition was terminal.

I don’t want to diminish her life by implying that Kristine’s passing was accelerated in order to help me; I only know that the Lord’s calculus is perfect, and just when I needed it, my mom was on her way to Virginia for the funeral. I soon received the hug I needed (and a bunch of other hugs in the bargain).

Kristine’s funeral was a special experience. I didn’t know her well in life; we spent most of our lives on opposite sides of the country. But I feel like I got to know her a little better by hearing her family’s stories about her strength, courage, and adventurous spirit. There was grief, but no intimation of complaint. The over-riding feeling was gratitude for her life, and rejoicing in who she is. When I think of her, I feel she fulfilled her work in this life; she made it.

It was during the funeral that I received a second tender mercy.

My heart and mind were heavy with worry about the future. Law school is constantly looking several months (or years) down the road. Students are consistently asked (always by caring and well-meaning people), “What are you doing this summer?” or “Do you have a job/internship/externship yet?” or “Where are you taking the bar exam?” The pressure to know (or at least have some idea) of what you’re going to do is almost constant. For me, that pressure was getting to be too much. I simply did not have a plan and felt I was floundering just keeping up with my week-to-week work.

And then during the funeral in what I’m sure was a response to the promptings of the Spirit, Kristine’s mom (my aunt) shared some of the thoughts Kristine had saved in her phone to help her get through the last few months. The first thought she shared was, “Sometimes you don’t need a plan.”

It was exactly what I needed to hear.

It was a reminder that even if I don’t have a plan, God always does. He knows where I need to be and what I need to do and what I need to become. He knows I need a job to pay off my school loans. He knows the kind of environment I want to be in and the kinds of jobs I dread. He knows the type of work I want to do. I needed that reminder that sometimes I just need to let go.

So thank you, Kristine. I owe you one.

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This year is the 800th anniversary of the signing of the Magna Carta! Or at least part of it, according to my Trusts and Estates professor, who is an expert on the subject. You can hear about it from him and one of his colleagues by clicking here. Apparently some parts of the Magna Carta are still binding law in Virginia.

Also, Flat Stanley came to visit. It was fun to have a guest for a little while. We got some friendly smiles as we were touring Colonial Williamsburg.

Sadly, we didn't see any of these critters.
Still hibernation season, I guess.

Chatting with Thomas Jefferson.

Flat Stanley is considering his collegiate aspirations.

The sheep were indifferent to Flat Stanley, but he
was rather fond of them.

You can't see it in this picture, but the statue of Lord
Botetourt is wearing Mardi Gras beads.

Flat Stanley ate A LOT of my jelly beans
while he was here.