The end of law school.

Yesterday I took my last final exam of law school. I woke up a law student, and I went to bed a real person again. Sort of.

The last exam, as you may remember, was remedies, and I had about a week to prepare, which is a lot longer than I've had with other finals throughout law school. (The average is about three days.) I made my own outline from scratch, as usual, and then had to condense and digest it down to a two-sided 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper. This took some creative wording and font wrangling, but I did it.

I was sort of nervous before the exam. I worried that I hadn't prepared as much as I should and that I wouldn't be able to achieve that strong finish that I've been hoping for all semester.

However, I think I did just fine. Ottley exams are always fair, but they have a lot of issues to spot, so I spent the entire three hours frantically typing (as usual). Afterward, when I checked that my exam had uploaded, it was a weird feeling. The other graduating 3Ls in the class high-fived with me, but I left the room feeling that I'm not quite sure what to do now.

Luckily I was able to track down Edward and pick up some Bar/Bri study books, and then we went to dinner with Dave and Faron. Faron picked a laid-back tapas restaurant in Lincoln Park, and it was nice to sit in a small crowd and chat rather than the usual insane kegger drunk-fests, which is probably what will be occurring at various graduation parties (and after the bar).

I think that's really what makes it so weird - it's not only that I just finished three years of grueling legal education (with no job to show for it), but that we aren't quite finished - we still have the biggest test of all ahead.

But at least I can study for the bar outside, in the beautiful sun, and maybe even find some free time to get used to being a "civilian" again.

Goodbye, law school. In the words of Yoda, "not short enough it was."