Bar Fever

by T. Shining

Dear Diary,
Well, here we go, old friend! It's a been while, but I figure now is as good a time as any to get back in touch because - drum roll, please - starting first thing tomorrow, I'll officially be on leave from the office and diving

into the two giant boxes of bar exam prep books that have been sitting on my dining room table for three weeks. Daunting, yes, but not to worry - I've been through this drill before. Remember? I took the New York bar exam a few years ago and passed, but now that I've transferred to my firm's Los Angeles office, I have to go through the whole dance again. This time around, I thought it might be useful to document the process here, now that I have the benefit of perspective and a few years' legal experience under my belt. Who knows, maybe there's even the start of a book in here somewhere - Bar Exam Tips From a Real Live Lawyer. Or something like that. OK, off to bed!

Day 1: Off to a good start. It's 7 a.m. and I just made myself a power breakfast and outlined my study schedule. Looking at it, I'm getting a little concerned that my firm gave me only three weeks off to study - I think I studied for about two months last time around. Hmm. Then again, come on. I'm already a real lawyer. And spending 15 hours a day studying for the bar exam still beats spending 15 hours a day spinning my wheels on a fire-drill deal for some deranged partner, right? On to torts.

Day 2: Aww, "eggshell skull"! Remember that one from 1L? Cute. Well, nothing I can't handle so far. It's almost kind of fun. Almost. Starting contracts tomorrow - and hello, I'm a corporate attorney in real life; all I do is analyze contracts. Going to skip the lecture materials and just start on the practice questions. This one should be a gimme.

Day 3: Why do all of these practice questions seem to involve an oral contract for 600,000 velvet hats that spontaneously explode before delivery? Who orders that many hats without writing something down?

Day 5: This is ... not going as planned.

Day 6: OK, look: I closed 13 deals last year - in a recession. I bill out at almost seven hundred bucks per hour. I have a hot secretary. Why am I getting all of these questions wrong? What the hell is going on?

Day 8: I finally figured it out: I'm too good of a lawyer to do well on the bar exam. I can make any answer choice work if you give me enough time and let me bill for it. Because in real-life lawyer land, there's only one answer to any legal question, ever: "Whatever the client wants." Was there a breach of contract? I don't know; does the client want there to be one? Should the evidence against Defendant Danny be excluded? Depends; are we representing him? Is it raining outside? Maybe; define outside. See? I'm just too smart for this stupid test. That's got to be it.

Day 10: I'm sorry, but no. Just no. No lawyer in the history of the universe has ever needed to know what a "fee simple determinable with a springing executory interest" is. Are the bar examiners serious?

Day 11: They're serious.

Day 12: On the 1-to-10 scale of Bad Ideas, where does calling your employer to find out if you're automatically fired if you fail the bar exam rank? 6? 6½?

Day 13: OK, you know what? Here is what the bar exam should be: Take a pale, puffy nerd with prematurely graying hair and man boobs, lock him in a windowless room for four days, with no human contact and nothing to eat aside from what he can forage out of a vending machine, and tell him to find a typo in a stack of documents bigger than a Mack truck. That's what qualifies you to be a real lawyer. How's that for a bar exam tip, huh, huh? Forget it. NONE OF THIS MATTERS IN REAL LIFE.

Day 14: OK, I've regrouped. An emergency vodka tonic last night may have had something to do with it. Don't judge me.

Day 15: Going on two weeks now without ever actually leaving my apartment. Even the food-delivery guys are starting to look a little terrified of me. I can't blame them - I'd be terrified, too, if I went to deliver a chicken parm platter and was met at the door by Beetlejuice clutching a binder full of legal outlines and muttering about California's testamentary interliniation doctrine. Now leave me alone; it's time to feed.

Day 16: Dammit. Forgot to shower again.

Day 17: The bad news: I just spent the last six minutes talking about holographic wills to a cow-shaped pillow that my brother gave me for Christmas last year. The good news: The cow hasn't started talking back. Yet.

Day 18: Oh God, I need a break. I can't do this anymore. Please. Please, someone help me.

Day 19: No interest is good unless it must vest, if at all, not later than 21 years after a life in being at the creation of the interest. What? No interest is good unless it must vest, if at all, not later than 21 years after a life in being at the creation of the - Hey, why is my phone ringing? It's not even on. Make it stop ringing. MAKE IT STOP RINGING.

Day 20: Need. People. Sunlight. No more test bubble, answer is D. Need see people. Need seeeesafssseewwwzz ### ...

Day 21: Dear Diary, Mom, Executive Committee of the Firm,
I'm sorry that you only gave me three freakin' weeks to study for this state-sponsored torture, you heartless bastards to be the source of potential embarrassment for you. A mere 8 hours from now, I'll be taking the bar exam, and in 72 hours I will be drunk it will be over. At this point, my only realistic goal for the exam is to try not to pee on myself make a noble effort. When the results come out in a few months, I will already have nine headhunters on speed dial just request that you be forgiving. I'll make it up to you, I promise. I'll bill more hours. I'll stop complaining and will make an effort to respect smile at all the partners. But do what you must; I'll understand. Just please, for the love of God, don't ever, ever make me take this test again.

T. Shining is a pseudonym for an associate at a large, national law firm.

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