gam zeh ya'avor

it's hard to explain what it's like to take four law school exams in ten days, each 100% of the grade for their respective classes. you're tempted to feel the past few months hardly even mattered, and that this week-and-a-half is what decides your fate. you know its not true, you learned too much along the way for that to really be possible. but it's tempting. and then the headaches come, the back of your mind suddenly screaming that it's too much for one man to handle. you just have to breathe, remind yourself you've done it before and you'll do it again. it just sucks. and ultimately, i hate to say, that's what's it like to be a 1L. it pretty much just sucks.

i could hardly do anything -anything- without thinking "shouldn't i be studying?" i hate thinking that. it's not so much that i'm against studying and working hard - ok, maybe it is - but not being able to relax or enjoy myself in any conceivable way without feeling guilty about it; that's the killer. sometimes it got to the point where i instinctively thought "shouldn't i be studying?" while i was actually studying.

the only way i can conquer it is to truly enjoy studying. and i don't mean the end-of-the-day satisfaction of patting yourself on the back. i mean actually depriving in-the-moment pleasure. you know, to the point where you say "hey i've got an hour to kill, let's start the new chapter in property law!" that kind of thing. and some people can do it; and God bless'em for it. i can't do it easily - but i can on occasion. which is why i'm there in the first place.

but 1L is over. i'm home for a month before leaving for england for a 10-day vacation and then taking classes at the university of london for about about a month.

i think 2L and 3L will be better. i'll either be essentially home at elon, fairly close to home at mercer, or in an apartment outside of wilmington. either way, i'll be free of my biggest source of frustration - that damn dorm. the trash in the sink, the bathroom windows with a giant "FU**" written in soap, the unflushed toilets, the squealing refrigerator, the inexplicably loud buzzing sound from one of the lights outside my window. i couldn't even take a walk at night (my stress relief of choice) without widener's security giving me odd looks or stopping to talk to me because someone complained of "a guy walking around wearing a black hood."

having just that one, small room as the only place to call my own within a 500-mile radius took a psychological toll on me i wasn't expecting. i guess you could say it wasn't so much the stress, but the inability to relieve it - not having a sanctuary to run to. no quiet, empty place to walk to, no friend across the hall, no short drive home. i probably sound like i've spent the past year wallowing in misery, but that's not true. more like just going through the stressful motions of being a 1L, when it's sometimes hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. but i knew it was there.

i knew that this too shall pass.