The hell of it all...

I have no idea how I’m going to react if I fail. On the other hand, I have no idea how I’ll react if I pass. I doubt I’ll be overblown with joy, more like exhausted relief. If lady luck doesn’t shine my way, I'd like to think that I be able to follow Legis's extremely healthy attitude after recently learning that she didn’t pass. I've excerpted a portion of his recent post.

Unfortunately, it’s happened again. No pass. Today I wasted absolutely no time. About 20 minutes after the results came online, I checked my results then immediately reapplied online, ran to the bank to notarize my application slip, ran to the post office to mail it priority mail, ran to the computer store to get my secret weapon, and ran back to work. All in under one hour.

I know that I felt more confident going into the last exam than I had in previous times because I now know the drill and I felt the time was coming close. But I hadn't really done the work to prepare. Now I've got my steady nerves and a resolve to really do the work.

***

No more days off for this thing. I'm taking three days to take the exam - that's it. I'm going to save my vacation time for a real vacation this year. Because by then I will have earned it. I can finally be proud of myself. And I can move on to perhaps a new career.

But first I have to get this summer overwith.

I don't know if I'll be able to share Legis's grit and determination on this one. In fact, I'm pretty sure I won't. At any rate, I guess I'll find out how soon enough how I'll end up handling whatever news is waiting for me on the other side of the Cal Bar website.

A wasted year?

I think the scariest/worst aspect of failing the bar is the sheer amount of time that is wasted as a result. At about this time last year I was skating through a bunch of bullshit classes that I knew even less about then, than I do know. I was getting ready to graduate, to enjoy my two days of vacation between the end of law school and the start of PMRB, and was generally trying not to think too hard about the eternal boredom and monotony that I knew would be my 6 week journey through BarBri.

I have to say that it feels like some sort of sick joke that I’m less than 10 days away from my 1 year PMBR anniversary, and that I will have blown an entire year of my life alternatively studying, waiting, obsessing, dreaming, and thinking about the bar before I actually find out whether I passed this time around. With the exception of infancy, I don’t think I’ve ever accomplished less over the course of a year in my life. I’d love to be able to say on some sort of meta level that I’ve learned a lot about myself during the past year or some bullshit like that, but the reality of it is that the only things that have changed is the calendar, my bank account, and probably a bunch of other things that are too depressing to think about. Maybe in 10 years I’ll look back on this whole experience and be able to laugh, or extract some pearl of wisdom from this whole ordeal, but from my current perch I fail to see how this can be seen as anything other than a blown year.

This entire experience has been one never-ending string of humiliation, gut-checks, and frustration. One very astute commenter wrote, "[t]his hell is not something I would ever wish on anyone, even my worst enemy. Wait, lately that seems to be me." I really couldn't agree more.

Attack of the phantom fees

I recently began the painful process of paying down my private loans. Needless to say, it has been a thoroughly frustrating experience. Like most lenders, my lender doesn’t actually service my loan so I have to deal with this company based somewhere in middle earth (i.e, the Mid West) that makes it virtually impossible to get a living breathing person on the phone. When I do manage to actually talk to someone, the person clearly has no idea about anything remotely related to loans.

The other day I got my statement and was horrified to see that my principle was actually increasing. I pay enough each month so that I should expect to see my principle decrease each month. After three frustrating phone calls, and three incredibly obtuse and nonsensical answers to my questions about why my principle keeps going up, I finally got a hold of someone who, in all likelihood, will probably be fired for making the mistake of telling me that the loan service company had added a “one time service fee” of over 700 dollars. I specifically remember choosing my private loan provider based on the fact that they charged zero fees for servicing the loan. Naturally, the hapless customer service rep was completely unable to point to a single provision in my loan documents that gave them the right to charge any fees much less 700 freaking dollars. Its bad enough that the interest rate on my loan is starting to look more and more like a credit card, but to tack on an additional 700 bucks from which even more interest is going to accrue is fucking killing me. I’m also pissed at how many conversations I had to have with assorted loan flunkies before someone managed to get around to telling me about the presence of this mystery fee. I can’t imagine an industry, especially in light of the massive student loan kickback scandals, more deserving of serious regulation and oversight.

T-Minus 23 days and counting...

I guess we're finally on the home stretch for bar results. I don't know about everyone else, but bar results are about all I can think about at the moment. I haven't quite found the right non-law job I was hoping to find, thus the issue of whether or not I pass is becoming more important. I'm also starting to have rather vivid nightmares about the bar exam itself, as well as pretty nasty flashbacks back to that horrific evening last November when I found out that I didn't pass the first time. I'm really dreading checking to see if I'm on the pass list on the 25th, and can only imagine how slowly the next 3 weeks and change will drag along.

Like a bad song...

I have very mixed feelings about the fact that there are 36 days until results come out. I think it's still too far away to care all that much about, on the other hand, I'm starting to get sick of the occasional flashes of dread whenever something bar related pops into my head. It's been kind of like getting a bad song stuck in my head, it eventually goes away but its definitely something I can do with out.

What if...

Reader Curious asked a good question in the comments section, one that I’ve given considerable thought to:

Have you thought about what you will do if you obtain a non-legal job in these next couple of months and then find that you have indeed passed the bar? Will you still leave your current position?
I'm in a similar position, and I'm debating how to move forward. Although I dislike the practice of law, I would feel bad choosing to leave my firm after having been supported by them during my re-taking of the bar.

First, I can only say that it depends on the type of non-law job I manage to find. I’m fairly deep in the interview process for a couple of non-law jobs (don’t want to jinx anything by naming the industries I’ve been targeting at the moment – am willing to go into more specifics via email). If all goes according to plan the issue of whether or not I pass or fail will be immaterial. I’m targeting industries where my legal education is of some value, but by not essential.

I don’t necessarily share Curious’ entirely warranted concern about feeling bad about leaving a firm after being supported by them during bar largely because the only support my firm gave me during my second attempt was to provide assurances that they would hold open my crappy clerkship and hire me as an associate should I pass this time around. Had they paid for my time off or for a bar review course, I might feel a little more loyalty, but in the dog-eat-dog world that is life I really have to keep my interests at the forefront and not worry too much about whether or not I’m going to burn any bridges on my way to getting the fuck out of law.

Finally, as a practical matter even if I wanted to go back into law right away after hypothetically making the jump and then finding out in May that I did in fact pass the bar I don’t think I’d be able to do anything about it given the absolutely horrendously over-saturated entry level legal market here in the bay area. Although I have a ton of legal experience I have no illusions what will happen if I ditch my current firm. I know, aside from issues related to the dearth of jobs, that I would have considerable difficulty finding another law job on account of failing the bar and exposing myself to questions about why I left my current firm after working there for nearly two years. However, I really feel that if I leave my fate to chance and wait to see whether or not I passed, I may very well find myself in a situation where I will be left scrambling to find a new job without a license. I guess I would rather run the risk of jumping out of the law then risk failing and essentially having to leave the law anyway.

In the end, I guess that if I pass after finding a non-law job I know I'll feel really good about passing, but doubt that I'll want to jump back into the law as a result. I've really come to the conclusion that I find the law tedious and boring and would probably rather do just about anything else then devote the rest of my life to the eternal joys that are discovery requests and cataloging the procedural requirements for quieting title to an outhouse, or some shit like that.

Back from the abyss (sort of)

Haven't posted for a while due to a combination of work, the ongoing job search, and various other time constraints. It finally seems that my schedule is about to clear up somewhat and I'll be able to resume my semi-regular posting schedule.