initial impressions

So far, so good. A week and a day into the Law School Experience, and I don't hate it yet.

Sure enough, I was feeling absolutely overwhelmed at the beginning of the first week, but as the days slowly pass by I feel as though I'm settling into a groove of intense focus and acute diligence. If I can keep up the momentum, I think I'll be okay.

My classes are all great, and if I'm crazy for thinking that, so be it; but I'm totally enjoying this. From Contracts to Criminal Law, Civil Procedure and Torts. The Legal Research and Writing class is the only one that's at all dull. (And it doesn't help that it's at 4pm, which just happens to be the time every day when my mind kicks out of high gear after go-go-going since 6am.)

All of my professors are awesome, and in that regard I feel I am very fortunate; others I've talked with have at least one professor they would rather not have. Perhaps my insanely positive attitude helps in this regard.

The atmosphere here is one of congeniality amongst the students and absolute support from the faculty. None of that Socratic humiliation here. Sure, the Socratic method is utilized, but it is with rhyme and reason and with no intent other than to help us orally articulate our budding legal minds.

And the competition among the students is barely palpable beneath the surface. Sure we will be ranked at the end of the year, but right now we're all just struggling to stay alfoat, and thus more than willing to help one another. From my perspective, the rankings are little to compete over, because in the end it will boil down to each individual's dedication, diligence, and natural capacity for legal reasoning.

The campus itself is spectacular. I feel as if I have finally arrived to a place where I belong. I've never been to a school like this: an old, prestigious university, with oak-lined lanes and old stone buildings. And yet it is the kind of place I've always imagined myself belonging. It's as if I have always known I would someday, somehow get to a place like Tulane, steeped in history and beauty and busting at the seams for all the knowledge it has to offer me, but I never quite knew how it would happen that I might find myself in such a place. And yet here I am, and it's difficult to convince myself that this is, in fact, my campus. In time familiarity and comfort will replace the intimidation and novelty, and I'll feel as at home here as I ever did at JSU.

In some ways I feel like it's 1997 and I'm a freshman all over again, and in some ways that is true; amongst the upperclassmen, the faculty and staff, I'm just another new face. But I'm making friends. The variety of people I've encountered is stunning. It stands in stark contrast to my experience at JSU, where folks seemed to have been pressed from a half-dozen or so molds. At Tulane, my fellow 1Ls come from all over the country and the world, they're of all age groups (I'm not the only married student for a change! And some are even parents, too!), and there's a variety of ethnic and cultural groups represented.

It's odd to find myself here, coming from JSU. There, it was obvious that I did not belong, and I had become accustomed to being the odd student out. Here the situation is wholly different; I feel as if I belong, and I feel a sense of camaraderie with all of my fellow 1Ls. But at the same time, I feel acutely aware of my difference. I'm the girl who only completed the 9th grade. I'm the one who took the alternative route: GED to junior college, and then to university and now law school. I don't have the common bonds that many of the younger students share: high school prom, graduation, moving away to college, dorm life, and so on and so forth. My path has been one less traveled, and yet I've arrived just the same. The differences between myself and my classmates at JSU were both external and internal; here the difference is almost wholly internal, and so it is a different sort of chasm to navigate in order to cultivate friendships. And I'm positive that I'll leave Tulane with several friends for life, which were a rare commodity at JSU.

All in all, I'm completely enamored. This is absolutely one of the best decisions of my life, and the most satisfying, awesome thing about it is that I'm here thanks to little more than my wits and my perseverance.

There's a ton of work waiting for me, and it's going to be a challenge, but one I'll be able to meet, and in the end I'll be so much better for it. So, bring it on, I say.

getting oriented

Today was the first day of orientation, and it stands out in my mind as little more than a blur of new faces walking through the humid August air, like myself, trying to make sense of the fact that their 1L journey has begun. This, punctuated by gems such as this quote from Charles Hamilton Houston: "A lawyer is either a social engineer or a parasite on society," which, together, cumulatively served as poignant reminders of the fact that I am on the right path after all.

So at this point I'm feeling confident and good, because if there's anything I want to do in this life it's to help "engineer society" in virtuous, meaningful ways. And much of the substance of today's programs re-convinced me of my ability to do that, especially once I'm armed with that TLS degree and all that I shall endure to obtain it.

I have more to share, but I'm exhausted from my efforts to take in and retain some meaningful portion of the deluge of information which swept over me today, not to mention the physical exertion of walking to and fro all the day long, and I simply must get some rest so that I can be prepared to do it again tomorrow.

More impressions will follow...

battening down

Today marks my last day of life-before-law-school.

The maelstrom begins tomorrow with orientation; it won't be long before I'm struggling to stay afloat in a sea of legal thought, theory, writing, rules, and regulations.

In preparation of the importance of my obligation to be punctual and prepared tomorrow, I'm about to leave to make a test-run on the streetcar to get my timing figured out. Not only must I rely on public transportation to get me to campus on time - a heretofore alien concept - but I must then walk approximately half-a-mile from the streetcar stop to Weinmann Hall. And I don't yet know how long all of this is going to take me. Of course, once I figure that out I'll be departing the house earlier than I think I should the first couple of times, until I feel more comfortable with the reliability of the streetcar's timetable.

Otherwise, I must finish my started-but-not-yet-completed orientation reading assignments, and pick out a "business casual" outfit (as suggested by TLS) for Wednesday which will be cool and comfortable but still make for good first impressions.

Then, there will be little left to do but wait for tomorrow to come and for this Big Thing I've been so eagerly anticipating to actually happen. Chamomile tea will certainly be necessary to help me prepare myself mentally without too much worry.

in another town

Well, I survived the hottest, longest, most miserable move ever (note: never, ever move to New Orleans in July if you can help it). And it was followed by several weeks without internet connectivity, but now all that mess is behind me.

Happily, although the move seemed to take forever-and-a-day, and was indeed unbearably hot, the process of settling in has gone much more smoothly than the process of getting here. It has been slow-going, but almost everything has now found its place. My proudest achievement is that all of the books are now categorized - a feat which hasn't been accomplished in far too long - and all have been neatly shelved in a manner which Adam has termed the Jacqui-decimal system, despite the absence of decimals or digits from the system. The closets are busting at their seams, but that's okay, because less than a half-dozen boxes remain to be sorted and unpacked.

So it goes that this little Garden District apartment - while perhaps a bit too small in actuality - continues to morph into a lovely home for us. 'Tis not my secluded duplex with three years' worth of memories, but when I stop playing the comparison game this new little place is quite nice on its own merit.

Yesterday I cooked from-scratch eggs benedict po-boys, which I paired with mimosas, and it was the perfect NOLA brunch. It was a celebration of sorts, of our last day off together before Adam starts his new job and I get thrown into the madness of being a 1L.

When I'm alone in the bedroom such as now I can hear the St. Charles streetcar roaring past. It's a sound I'm starting to get accustomed to, just like many other things about this truly unique city...

life as a chapter book

As I write this I ought to be packing, but I've convinced myself that I deserve a few leisure moments to sip my coffee and enjoy the therapeutic indulgence of writing my thoughts instead.

My time at Allen & Conway officially ended on Tuesday, June 30. I am living now in a bizarre sort of flux as my days here grow immensely short. I'm technically unemployed until I find a job in New Orleans. My house has been emptied of many of its defining elements (dining room furniture, couches, books on shelves) and is filled instead with boxes, a state which inevitably occurs when a move is imminent, and which I affectionately refer to as "Box House." Our handy-dandy Honda FIT has been in cargo-mode for several days now, and The Move officially commences tomorrow when the big truck gets loaded up and what little furniture we still have gets transported with the multitude of boxes to the Crescent City. After that, we'll take it slow and easy for a few days, living in a truly in-between state whilst transporting any straggler boxes, clothes, and the like in the FIT. Our bed is staying here until Monday, when we'll take it down in a borrowed pick-up truck and the kitties will be transported in twin kitty-kennels in the FIT.

It feels weird to be leaving all of this behind: the stress of my job, the familiarity of this city, and the company of dear friends. But this chapter of my life is coming to a close, and only so much can carry over. Truly, it is time; 9 years makes for a long chapter. The new chapter awaits with a new setting, a new cast of supporting characters, new challenges, opportunities, and accomplishments. And even while I'm eager to move away and proceed with the story of my life, I'm more than a little pained to turn the page and leave this chapter in the past.

So it goes, I suppose, that as one moves on to bigger and better things, the comfort of routine and familiarity must fall by the wayside, at least temporarily. And frequent goodbyes, as I well know, are part and parcel of this modern mobile life. Thus continues my life as a chapter book, with the Jackson chapter coming to a quick close and the New Orleans chapter patiently waiting for this page to turn.

beginnings and endings

Final grades for the Spring semester have been issued, and I managed to wrap up my tenure as a graduate student with a 4.0. Yay!

I only hope that I can keep up the momentum in law school. I doubt it, though. Perusing Tulane’s recent honorees leads me to believe that there must be one really difficult class, because all of the honorees – some of whom were at the top of their class – had GPAs in the 3.8 range. But I shall try my hardest and hope for the best.

People lately have been telling me “Congratulations,” and it still catches me by surprise. I was congratulated when I got married, and when I graduated last May, which makes sense to me. Going to law school doesn’t exactly strike me as the kind of thing one would be congratulated for – am I being commended for going into enormous debt? extolled for uprooting my family? praised for committing three more years of my life to more formal education? I suppose it is the achievement of getting accepted into a prestigious old law school that is being congratulated, but somehow it doesn’t feel like much of an achievement right now. No, right now it feels like a terrifying blind leap, taken on the chance and hope that this course will make a happier life for myself and my family in the long run.

Tulane offers me the following advice:

Relax this summer, and be ready to work hard when school starts.

And while that’s comforting to hear, the stress of the pending move makes it difficult. I know that it will all work out, but the uncertainty – the not yet knowing precisely how it all will unfold – is what eats away at me. As conscientious as I’d like to be – trying sometimes in vain to diligently make preparations and plans for The Move – in the end I realize that there’s only so much control I can exert on the way this chapter of my life shall end.

So I’ve lately resorted to reading The Witching Hour as a means to distract myself. And it seems to be working. That dense, lengthy Anne Rice novel which first caused me to fall in love with New Orleans does wonders to calm my nerves. And while offering the comfort of a previously read book, the story seems so much more vivid this time around, now that I have experienced the charm of the Crescent City first-hand, and it is no longer simply a made-up story-stage in my mind.

But this in-between time is bittersweet. Although my mind is mostly in New Orleans lately, my heart aches at certain Jackson sights. Like the flag pole in my cul-de-sac that's been crooked since the 4/4 tornado of 2008:


Something about these waning spring days strikes me as exceptionally splendid. Each magnolia blossom and cool crisp breeze brings a wave of nostalgia for something I haven’t even left yet, but which I know I will miss dearly. And though I know that this town will not fall off the face of the earth when I depart, I also know how it is to move away and return to a place you used to know intimately. Each change – a new building here, a widened street there – seems forced and artificial when you’re not around to witness a city’s organic growth. So it goes that I know visiting will never be the same, even as my time here goes shorter with each sunset. And even while I mourn my absence from this place that’s come to be my home over the last decade, I eagerly await building a new life, as a law student at Tulane University. It is so very exciting, after all.

lessons learned

Well, the semester is finally over and done, and with it my time at JSU comes to an end. It’s been a good three years; for all the trial and tribulations, not only do I have a degree (and 4 graduate credits should I ever decide to return to grad school), but I have a wealth of knowledge and experiences that are priceless and that have indelibly shaped my life’s course for the better.

One of the most important things I’ve learned is that, while my conscientiousness and thoughtfulness sometimes cause me unnecessary stress, they are, in fact, traits which serve me well. It is none other than these traits which cause me to consistently put out quality work, whether in school or at work. And the important lesson here is this: So long as I put forth my best effort to meet my own (overly high) expectations, I will nearly always exceed the expectations of others, and certainly meet them at the very least.

My research paper experience made this plain to me. Despite my fretting over the last few weeks, in the end I cranked out what I deem to be a solid piece of scholarly work, and I was actually proud of what I turned in to my professors. I’m still waiting on feedback before I revise it for submission to the Preyer scholars competition, but I feel good about the work that I’ve done, which is a pleasant feeling indeed.

This semester has also taught me that, while others may indeed share the passion and fervor for knowledge that fuels my scholastic endeavors, I do have an innate advantage which lies inside my skull. Although I often times curse my intelligence because I’m constantly over-thinking everything and from time to time it seems to impede my ability to reach a mindstate even resembling the ignorant bliss of the masses, in the end I am grateful to have a sharp, keen mind with which to understand the world around me.

I’m writing this not to toot my own horn, but because I know I’ll be entering a whole new world at Tulane Law School. I’ll be surrounded by other bright, driven young folks as opposed to the poorly educated slackers who comprised the bulk of my so-called “peers” at JSU. And I’m certain that in law school I’ll face intellectual challenges unlike any I’ve encountered thus far in my educational adventures. That being the case, this is simply an exercise in bolstering my assurance in myself; a way to store up my confidence for those inevitable times in the coming years when I’ll be questioning myself and my ability to succeed.

With the semester over and done I’ve returned to work full time, which sucks in a way I’ll not indulge myself in describing, because it does no good to dwell on such unpleasantries. All there is to do is suck it up, grin, and bear it for the next several weeks. The tricky part is going to be reserving enough mental energy to plan and effectuate The Move after working 9+ hour days, but I’ve no doubt that I’ll make it work, someway somehow.

In addition to planning The Move, I’ve got many projects underway, most of which are related in some way to relocating my household or remaking my life into that of a law student. Redesigning this blog and my web presence over at jkhammack.com are among these projects, so be on the lookout for changes and links and such, as well as more regular postings.