Friday, December 30, 2005

Selah

In the middle of this vacation, I find myself completely alone, but by no means lonely. The break has been long enough for me to feel that the intense pressure of law school is a surreal, unreal, and strange existence.

As difficult as it was, I enjoyed the exams because they were extremely challenging. From what I've heard, the bar exam is crazy-hard, so I'm glad the law school is preparing me for such a hard test. It would be a disservice for my professors to make things easy for me and leave me ill-prepared for the bar. That's not the only reason I'm glad law school is so rigorous. I also know that in real law practice, a lawyer is faced with some really difficult situations. In a law office, the fact pattern morphs into someone's real life. You can't just be amused by a professors creativity and try to determine the best answer when someone is sitting in front of you with jacked up life situations expecting you to provide the solutions.

My plan for the Spring semester is to come up with a way to synthesize the information way before finals. If I can come up with a way to get an understanding earlier, the pressure of finals won't be so taxing. (Yeah, right.) Anyway, I guess I should wait to see what my grades look like before I determine how to tackle my classes. I may already have a pretty good strategy. We shall see.

Thursday, December 15, 2005

First Semester Completed

It's finally over. The contracts final was manageable, but there were still multiple choice questions that absolutely stumped me. Some of the concepts are just hard to grasp to the point that you can answer questions based on various complicated fact patterns. I'll get there with practice. Understanding a concept is just the first step. The most important part is being able to apply the concept to situations.

Now that I understand how to effectively use the words "maybe," "probably," and "likely," I look forward to the challenges of the writing class next semester. I'm sure the professors will post the first class assignments before classes start, but right now, I'm looking forward to enjoying the break.

I plan to go to a Tarrant County Black Bar Association Christmas party next week. I didn't have time for those types of events during the first semester, but I hope to attend a few in the Spring because it's good to network.

For the summer, I'd like to work at a law firm in Arlington. I was successful in getting a job at a law firm before school started, and I'll employ the same method and see what happens this time.

Friday, December 09, 2005

Civil Procedure Final et al

I just finished my civil procedure final, and I'm in the library preparing to prepare for property. I probably should go somewhere, relax and watch a movie or something, but I don't have money or time to waste.

The civil procedure final was challenging as I expected. I was able to finish with time left over, and I was really surprised. I probably missed some issues, and that's okay because I'm only human. When I got up to take a bathroom break, my prayer was that I would at least complete the exam.

I have a strategy for editing my property outline that I think will help me over the next two and half days of study time I have left. I hope it works.

Thursday, December 08, 2005

Open Book Exam

There is some comfort in having an open book exam because you can assure that you'll get the rule right. However, I expect some crazy hard challenges in the analysis part of the Civil Procedure test tomorrow at 1 p.m. The worrisome thing is that class was cancelled today because of a winter storm in the area. I would have felt better if I had gotten my library time in today. I'll go to school as early as possible tomorrow so I can get my fix among the books. I've always loved books, libraries, book stores. Just to walk or sit in the midst of books brings me comfort. I wonder if I could take my test in the library?

My strategy for the Torts exam worked okay. The best part of that test was that I wasn't pressed for time. On the other hand, I may have had so much time left over because I missed something. We'll see how that goes when I get my grades next month.

As for preparing for an open book test or any test for that matter. Friends are usually willing to share their outlines with you, and that's great. However, it can't replace working through your own outline. As they told us at the beginning of the year, if you make your own outline, it helps you understand the information better. Everyone has a different method of learning. You just can't substitute someone else's process for your own, but you can use other people's outline to make sure you didn't miss something or just to see how they understand a difficult idea.

No matter how you prepare for an open book exam, you can expect it to be tremendously challenging.

Monday, December 05, 2005

Count Down to Torts Final

Well, I'm in the libarary looking over my outline and listening to some great music through my headphones, of course. I sat with my friends and acquantainces for a while. They were all true to form. They are all pretty smart, and they're all handling the stress of this first test differently, according to their various personalities. After the test, the most laid back of us (which may be me) will say, see I told you we didn't have to worry about multiple sufficient implied secondary assumption of the risk. While the most studious of the bunch will say, see I told you we needed to know ALL those factors.

I feel like this first test is the measure for the rest of our experiences as law school students. On the other hand, it's just one test. But it's the FIRST test.

I had a great talk with my writing professor as soon as I got into the building. That was probably the best thing I could have done at this time. Like all my professors, he's an amazing brainiac, but he was able to relate to me in my mere mortal One L state and offered wonderful advice and encouragement. He did emphasize that this and all law school tests are supposed to be hard. He went on to explain how to handle the difficulties, but I'm not going to share all the helpful stuff he said. But I will say this. Whenever you're about to go through something, it usually helps to talk to someone who has already been there.

Torts Final

The Torts final is at 6:30 tonight. This is my first law school final. I usually don't have anxiety before a bit event, but right when the thing is about to start, I'll get some butterflies in my stomach and wonder what the heck I'm doing subjecting myself to such stress in this wonderful life. This is what I signed up for so I'm okay with it.

Here's my plan for writing my essay. For the intentional torts of battery, assualt and intentional infliction of emotional distress, I'll disucuss the claim/issue, the rule, and then apply the fact pattern to the rule. Depending on the fact pattern, I'll state some deficiencies in the argument and then state a conclustion. I'll then have a section where I discuss defenses to the claim: consent, self-defense, defense of others, or defense of property.

For negligence claims, I'll discuss Duty, Breach, Cause, and Damages. I'll point out weaknesses int he argument like intervening/supersceding causes, whether the act was really a proximate cause, whether there was really a duty. After that I'll discuss the defenses to negligence: comparative negligence of the plaintiff, assumption of the risk, failure to mitigate damages or protect against risks, and possible immunities depending on the fact pattern.

I'm almost sure the essay will have some combination of intentional torts and negligence claims. It may also involve strict liability, recklessness, and a whole bunch of other stuff that we'll have no time to address. I think I'll dedicate a section to unaddressed issues and briefly state them all in the last paragraph of the essay portion. It may be worth a point or two.

Wednesday, November 30, 2005

Outlines and Study for Finals

Okay, so my Torts outline is probably too long, but I'm working with what I got at this point. My Contracts outline is GREAT! My contracts professor is so cool. "OOOO, I'll become a suit-filer!" You had to be there. Let's just say I've never had a professor who was such a talented guitar player and entertainer!

Civil Procedure is open notes and open book. There is a measure of comfort in that, but the standard is way high for that one.

Property. We'll see how that goes.

I think I understand what the professors will be testing us on. The issue is whether I'll remember all the nuances of the various concepts. For instance, in Torts, the essay question will most likely be about negligence and we'll have to write about duty, breach, cause in fact, proximate cause and damages. But, I'm sure our professor will throw some glitch in that will help the curve work. On the other hand, he'll want us to analyze every issue, so it's not like we'll be able to say there was no duty because that would mean we wouldn't need to analyze the other areas of a negligence claim. (That no duty thing would be a good counterargument.) I'm rambling, but my point is that the professors want us to show our understanding of certain principles, so that's why I'm almost positive the Torts essay will include negligence somehow.

I have an idea what the other classes will test us on in the essays. I started to write it all out, but I guess I'll keep my ideas to myself on that one. In any event, it's pretty obvious in each class what the essays will likely be about.

Monday, November 21, 2005

Memo Madness

It was difficult, but I got my memo within the page limits. I thought I started working on it early enough, but I wish I had another day to look at it.

Now I can focus on my doctrinal courses and prepare for finals. Torts is first on Monday, Dec. 5, Civil Procedure, Dec. 9, Property, Dec. 12, and Contracts, December 15. As my friend Kim Kossie would say, "Those who know the words of prayer, pray for me."

For the first time in the entire semester, I did not prepare for Contracts. That memo had me so strung out. I like Contracts, so I will definitely read the cases instead of relying on briefs. I'm disappointed because I'd gotten into the practice of doing all my contracts reading over the weekend. I don't know why it bothers me since we only have one more set of reading to do. Oh, well.

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Draft One Complete

I finally finished my first draft. I'd hoped to get it completed last night. Now I'll continue to edit it until it reaches "memo perfection." I actually found an example from the class that helped me better organize my arguments. It's a shame I didn't connect all those class assignments to my memo writing. If I had paid more attention, maybe I would have done better on memo 2.

In any event, I feel like I've accomplished something. Now I just have to get it within the page limits. My professor requires a 15-page limit, but some of the other writing professors are more lenient apparently.

Memo Fatigue

I'm plugging away at memo 3. I didn't meet my goal to have a completed draft by Friday. I think I'll have a draft today and be able to edit tonight and tomorrow. It's due Monday at 1:30 p.m. Even though it's a difficult process, I 'm enjoying it because every sentence is a challenge to analyze and write clearly.

When I get the urge to go off on a tangent of poetic prose, I may free flow write or think for a while until I get some phrase that was trying to burst forth. If the phrase fits, I use it. If it doesn't, I have to discard it as useless.

Writing is difficult. This stuff ain't easy.

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

Bogged Down

I find myself wasting way too much time surfing the net or just day dreaming. My brain must be on some kind of protest. Tonight, I'm going to try a change of location and see if that works. Even though my mind doesn't want to process any more information, I can't opt out of studying because there's just too much work to do.

The schedule for this week is helpful because we don't have our writing class on Wednesday or our Torts class on Friday. That leaves Friday totally free and I hope to get a lot of work done then. I'll probably use most of the extra time to work on memo 3.

Friday, November 04, 2005

People

One of my first college type experiences was when I went to the "Honors Colloquium" at UT while I was still in high school. I think this was UT's way of getting some of the top students in the state together to recruit as many as possible to UT. I had done pretty well on the PSAT and was targeted by a bunch of schools, but no school recruited me like UT did.

Well at the honors colloquium, we had plenty of time in the schedule to socialize, and at one point a bunch of students ended up in a small room, I think it was a dorm room in Jester and it was pretty crowded. I was talking to the person next to me and paused to let them get a word in when I realized that everyone in the room was talking at one time. No one was really listening at all.

My best friend and I have a saying, "I talk a lot because I have something to say." I contrast this saying with the grandma wit, "Ever wonder why God gave you two ears and one mouth?" As much as I like to talk, I'm trying to learn to listen more. I find that my classmates have pretty neat stories of their own to tell. Before my first year is over, I want to find the student who seems to be the most different than I am and get them to tell me their story.

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Memos

I think I've finished my second law school memo. I could edit the thing all night, but now that I'm within the page requirements, I'm ready to let it go. I thought about applying some of my graphic design tricks to make the thing fit, but it was much more rewarding to actually cut out words and agonize over sentence structure than to cheat with letter spacing and other secrets of the design world.

I'm thinking about turning it in tonight. It's probably wise to keep it and look it over at least one more time. I've wasted two dollars printing it out twice in the computer lab. Each time I was unable to edit the hard copy. I know that's exactly what I need to do at least once, so I'll probably spend another dollar on printing. My home printer doesn't have ink and who has time to go buy more? I still have to read for CivPro and Property!

Saturday, October 22, 2005

Overload

When I find myself goofing off during the time I set aside to study, I recognize this as brain overload. It's like my mind is saying "No more right now!" I really don't have time for this kind of rebellion. Sometimes I'm able to press on anyway, and sometimes if I provide a little distraction for the capricious side of me, I'm able to get back to the business at hand. This is hard work. There is so much to do. I recognize the need to relax and replenish. But I still have to get the memo written. I still have to read and brief all those cases. I still have to try to understand it all even after all the work is done. It's challenging, but I'm having the time of my life!

Happy Birthday to me

My birthday is tomorrow. When I was little, I used to have these big birthday parties and invite my whole class to my house. One time I forgot to tell my mom and she came home to a bunch of elementary school kids running around in and out of her house. She was a good sport and went to the store to buy a cake and food for my party! I won't be having a party this year because I haven't had time to do the necessary planning. I don't think my mom would go for it if I just invited a bunch of people over like I did when I was little. I'll just spend the day with my kids and get them to sing "Happy Birthday" to me all day.

Friday, October 07, 2005

Reasonable Minds Differ

The phrase “reasonable minds may differ” is used often, but whose reasonable minds are they talking about? Historically they certainly were not talking about the reasonable minds of folk who look like me because what my fore-mothers considered reasonable was certainly not contained in the American law of their day.

Wednesday, September 28, 2005

Wonderful

This is a wonderful time in my life. I'm sure I've mentioned how much I love to learn. There is always something new to learn, and the process is great.

I can see how being older is very helpful because for one thing, I don't have a problem with being wrong. I can remember being either a senior in college or a very recent graduate. I had volunteered to do a newsletter for a church and was devastated when the pastor had a bunch of changes and dared to correct my typos! I have come a long way from that bright-eyed, know-it-all. Growth is good.

My point is that when you are in law school, so many things you thought you knew are challenged on levels you would never think about. I actually like this process. I like having my understanding of fundamental principles challenged and in rare cases, affirmed. In most cases, I'm learning about fundamental principles that I never even considered.

I've shared about my personal family struggles to some extent because I want to make the point that when you embark on something challenging like law school, things may happen that could cause you to totally lose focus. It may be true that some things can be so devastating that you may have to withdraw from school. However, it is possible to continue even in the midst of a crisis. I spoke to a couple of deans and one of my professors (because I missed one of his classes) about my situation, and the support I received was genuine and understanding.

So, although this is one of the most challenging times in my life on a personal and academic level, it is also a most wonderful time. What doesn't destroy you can only make you stronger.

Friday, September 23, 2005

Contracts is Coming Along

I'm finally having those "aha, oh, I get it" moments in Contracts. That's probably a good thing because we're still at the beginning stages of this thing. Now if I can just build on this elementary understanding and make it all continue to fit together, I'll be okay, I think.

I had been using the closed study rooms because of the hard family stuff I'm going through. Right now I can't guarantee that I won't burst into tears at any moment. This morning I set up in the common study area, and sure enough, the tears started flowing. Fortunately, there weren't many students in the library between 8 and 9 a.m. this morning. Generally, I'm okay. This law stuff is really helping me get through this time because I have to spend a lot of time and energy thinking about contracts, torts, property, legal research, writing and analysis. Who would have thought law school could also be good, active therapy?

That's not to say I'm suppressing stuff or ignoring issues. I'm fully dealing with everything to the full extent the law will allow! However, I think it's important for me to continue with this law school endeavor for my family and for myself. I'm sure the crap that happened was supposed to test my stability and resolve. I may look like a mess when I'm crying over a casebook, but I won't stop reading through the tears.

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Stormy Distractions

What happened to my flow? I'm quite distracted by this current storm. I have more than a few friends and family in Houston. Some are already evacuating, and those who are staying don't live in flood zones.

Fortunately, my study scheme has me a little ahead in my reading. I've found it helpful to have time to ruminate over cases and other material. I don't pick up on all the nuances the first time I read some cases. In Torts and Contracts, the cases seem to be generally understandable. However, the problems and discussions after the cases cause me to go back and question my understanding.

In class, when the professor calls on a student and the student knows the answers, not only is this not exciting, I don't learn as much. When the professor has to ask a spiral of questions to get the student to the point, I'm able to gain a better understanding even if I know the answer outright. This spiral of questions causes me to look at the concept from different perspectives.

On another note, anyone interested in seeing or using the PrepPlan can acces it by clicking here. It's just a Word document you can modify for your own purposes. If you have trouble with the link and you want the document, just let me know and I'll email it to you.

Tuesday, September 20, 2005

An Ode to Torts

I am really enjoying Torts. The professor is cool, the book is understandable, and although everything is not simple, the concepts are certainly easier to grasp than the abstract ideas of property law where everything is steeped in some mysterious European history.

We got some feedback on our Memo 1 writing assignment. I was not surprised by the comments on my first submission. The suggestions were very helpful, and thankfully, the professor liked some things about my thesis paragraph and rule statement. I don't assume that because I'm a writer, I will do well on writing assignments. My strategy is to follow the directions as closely as possible and avoid my usual wordiness and entertaining style (heehee).

I feel like I'm in a zone, on a certain rhythm. I love to read, to study, to write, to change diapers (yeah, right! Thank God for grannys and aunts and cousins), to oversee first grade homework, to go to the school book fair late but not too late to buy the books on my daughters wishlist. Children are a joy. Law school is a challenge. And, it's all very wonderful.