Posts Tagged ‘holidays’

I always seem to get pretty down on myself during the holidays. Whether it’s my typical rollercoaster (verging on bipolar) emotional periods of self-doubt followed by “highs” of confidence or if it’s just some kind of seasonal depression, I usually am not as happy as the people around me during Christmas time. In fact, you might call me a downright Scrooge. I dunno, I’m just not into the holiday season. It all seems very fake to me. That, and life is just kind of lame right now. Grades still aren’t out and while I’ve been trying to convince myself I don’t care too much about them (as is the norm for law students it seems), I actually do care and I’d like to know whether my study habits are generally good or generally bad. And, I still have yet to land a job. I’m not sure what most people’s situation is, but it seems I am in the (unemployed) majority for the time being — however this is just one more uncertainty I could do without right now.

But back to Christmas, one thing in particular I absolutely cannot handle during this time of year is the music. Christmas music is awful. I’ll give you an example: I went to dinner with my parents and some family friends the other day and the restaurant hired carolers. They circled the floor of the restaurant singing, “Here we come a-wassailing” (how clever of them), and periodically stopped at tables to ask patrons what songs they would like to hear. When they got to our table, they asked: “Would you like to hear something traditional …. or jazzy?!?!” Of course, my parents went with jazzy. It was awful — the much too common and WAY overplayed Pat Boone-ish, Bing Crosby-esque syncopated version of some random Christmas song. I was embarrassed for the singers (since I’m sure on the inside, if they had much musical taste, they were dying a little). Yes, I am somewhat of a music snob, but not like an indy-rocker music snob. I just know when I hear bad music — and by and large, Christmas music is bad music. I suppose the other reason I hate Christmas music so much is because I used to work around a mall for several years during the holiday season. So I got to hear the same songs I hated so much over and over again for eight to ten hours a day.

Other than that, I miss Chicago. I thought coming back to my home town would be great. While in Chicago, I couldn’t wait to get back to see my old friends and eat at the local restaurants I enjoyed so much. But now that I’m here, I just wanna go back. Chicago is my new home now, and I love it there (yes, even Hyde Park). Before, I thought I might want to return home after graduation and get my legal career going here, but now I know that I would prefer not to do that. It’s kind of sad and kind of liberating at the same time. While I wouldn’t necessarily mind coming back here to live, I just know now that there is really nothing tying me to live in this place. I’ve only lived in Chicago for a few months, but I already feel more at home there than I do here, which may speak volumes to how enjoyable Chicago is in general. Anyway, I recommend the city.

Bah Humbug.

Using family in the larger sense, my family is somewhat lower class. My parents though, being the most successful of our clan, are more upper-middle class (they have a combined annual income that is probably a few ticks over $120,000). Despite their success, neither of my parents are college graduates. In fact, I was the first of all my cousins (more than fifty people if you count both sides) to graduate from a four-year university. It goes without saying then, that my going to Harvard Law School was a major family event.

And when I was 0L with my HLS acceptance in hand, I loved discussing my future profession and income.

• “Yeah Uncle Mike, they are paying first year attorneys $160,000 – crazy huh?”
• “I’m not sure Aunt Tammy, probably corporate litigation.”
• “Haha, I don’t think it’s selling my soul, that’s where the best work is.”

Now that I have a semester under my belt and we are all together again for the holidays, not only do I hate discussing this shit, when I do, I have to lie. Instead of:

• “Everyone is hideous and miserable.”
• “No it’s actually pretty easy.”
• “What did I learn? Well I know how to search Westlaw.”
• “The professors? I can’t even remember their names, much less what they failed to teach me.”
• “I spent more time drunk, watching Friends reruns, than I did studying.”
• “No Grandma, I can’t write your will, I don’t know shit about the practice of law.”
• “Cousin Johnny, I’ve sampled the women and I wouldn’t recommend them.”

I have to be all like:

• “Oh yeah, Boston is great.”
• “Harvard Law School attracts the best and the brightest, my classmates are very smart.”
• “We all basically live in the library, researching and studying.”
• “Haha, the Harvard Law girls are very smart and intimidating but who knows? I’ve gone on a few dates.”
• “No Grandma, I can’t practice law yet, but when you get your will done, let me look it over, I’ll make sure he treats you right.”
• “My professors and I had a number of heated debates. They definitely respect my opinion and consider me more of a colleague than a student.”

So I guess I’m trying to say that law school was just as bad as everyone said. I have yet to learn anything useful; it all feels like a huge waste of time. To quote our Vice-President, “law school is the biggest bore in the world.”

In brighter news, I found a job. A middle-sized firm in my hometown, $2750 a week. They were very understanding when I informed them that I was going to wait and see if anything materializes at a V50 before accepting. A cursory examination of their attorneys yielded two Harvard graduates, so I guess they have some experience with us. I have some concerns about the firm, primarily their lack of perks. I have to pay for my own parking, they rarely host big recruiting events, I’ll be responsible for three of my five lunches every week, etc. At least it pays…