What I Don't Want to Become

Via Ernie The Attorney.

It's been a while since I've written about my law school ambitions. They're still a factor, though lately I've been doing a bit of soul searching about what I should do with my life, and about what my calling in life really is. I have a somewhat longer post about that process coming up if I can manage to write it in a way that makes sense to anyone but me.

I've been exploring the inner reasons—the good ones and the not so good ones—why I think I want to go to law school and what I where I want to be if I manage to finish law school. But today, I came across a post that reminded me of exactly what I don't want to become if/when I manage to get into and complete law school.

At our partner lunches people talk about how it's awful that summer camp doesn't cover the entire summer, or how they don't know how to avoid giving the nanny a holiday bonus, or how they don't know why their kids hate them. They hate us because we're never home. They hate us because we're pulling out our Blackberries all weekend while we pretend (and they can tell when we're pretending) to enjoy being around them. They hate us because work is #1, and they're #2 -- or #3, or #4. It's sad. Because it's not like years from now we're going to regret not checking the Blackberry more often. It's sad because time passes really quickly and it starts to feel like "too late" very quickly. That's what keeps people here. By the time, maybe eight months into your first year, maybe a year a half -- but not much longer than that in most cases -- by the time you realize what this job is doing to you it feels like you're stuck. "It's too late." And so you hope it gets better. And you hope, and you hope, and you work, and you work -- and then it's no better, and even more so, "it's too late."

*shudder*

There's even more to consider in the Anonymous Lawyer's response to a question from one of his commenters, who is considering law school himself.

…Your question is "In other words, is there any hope for a young, aspiring attorney to have both a good legal career as well as to simply a good life?"

The answer, in my opinion, is that it is unlikely if you are a well rounded balanced person. But, some are happy, if they have a natural talent for the law, and they like it for itself.

Being a "good" lawyer means a massive dedication to work, and its a dedication that resembles that of the Prussian General Staff to the Kaiser. We don't question, at least in litigation, the moral nature of what we do, and we don't care. We care about winning, and if we win within the rules, that's what counts. At this point, I hate to loose with a passion, but I get no joy whatsoever out of winning. Just more billable hours is all it amounts to. Moreover, all lawyers in a firm (and I'm in a Western firm which would be regarded as small anywhere else but here) are in a cut throat economic competition with each other mandating hours far beyond what is sane. You may have, if you are lucky, one real friend in a firm, maybe two, but everyone else is an acquaintance ready to stab you in the back for an extra dollar. Most will gladly crawl over their fellows dead bodies when the time comes.

…Some lawyers are better at balancing life and work than I am by quite some margin. I'm not very good at it, as you can likely tell. For that reason, I probably should have looked for work I liked, rather than have looked for work in order to try to achieve the non work goals I had in mind. You may wish to consider that. If you love the law, maybe you'd be happy in it in spite of all the jerks, mercenaries, dolts, and others who are in it. There are probably some who meet that description, although. If you love money, and some do, perhaps, if your talents are employable in the law, you can make a lot of it and that will be enough. If you seek to use the law to support a life whose interest are elsewhere, well. . .

…In the end, only you can evaluate this. And you cannot take the advice of those typing over the net. Get some direct information from those you know, if you know somebody who can provide it to you.

I guess that after I work through some stuff about why I think I want to go to law school, I need some more "face time" with some practicing lawyers who can talk to me about their take on the profession.

I don't think there's any real danger of me turning into that picture, but if I do end up in law school, I'm going to print that out and tape it to my mirror so I can read it every single day, as a reminder.

Comments

[nappi]

what a dismal picture for what is such an honorable profession.

[Short North Mama]

When you said "I don't think there's any real danger of me turning into that picture," it makes me think of every one of my husband's law school friends who thought the same thing. And right now, the vast majority are working in jobs that are, at the very least, quite unpleasant. The happiest friend he has from law school left the law altogether and became a carpenter.

I can remember when my husband was a 2L interviewing for Big Firm jobs and everyone was talking about the 80 hour weeks and the miserable-ness of it all, but he really thought it wouldn't happen to him. But when he got that job, it was worse than what they said. He was miserable, I was miserable. The jerks there called him in from is paternity leave FOUR HOURS after our daughter was born. And he was so conditioned by their brutality that he went.

He finally escaped into a clerkship, but looking to the future, the lure of the Firm is hard for him to escape. The money and the prestige are like a drug.

[supa-james]

Lawyers tend to work to hard. Lately I hardly see my boyfriend because he's busy on some insane antitrust case, working 80+ hour weeks, and half-dead when he isn't working. Saturday we were going to see "The Producers" but he lost the tickets among the mess that is his office. Tonight I was supposed to go to see the Orioles game in the corporate uber-suite, but he forgot to request a guest ticket (which isn't too bad-the game was rained out and they were abandoned by the corporate bus) for me. Anytime we go anywhere I get stuck waiting for him to get off of a phone call, stop checking his voice mail, etc.. If he offers to pick me up somewhere I do so knowing that he will get stuck at work and be at least fifteen minutes late, even on weekends. If he wasn't planning to get out of this firm in the next few years (Or next year if Kerry actually wins the election, in which case he'll go into government) I would probably just leave him now.

[Senior Partner at a Major Wall Street Firm]

Let me share what I'm thinking but--by virtue of my position will never tell YOU. It is written in a decidedly UNLAWYERLIKE FASHION for emphasis.

First of all, any of you little sniveling shits that is billing the time spent reading this goddamned thing is committing fraud. If our firm spy-ware catches anyone at our firm reading this during time billed to a client, you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, disbarred and then fired.

Now, to the rest of you (law students and civilians): At the interviews, I never hear any of this pathetic whining. 2Ls and 3Ls are such troopers in the callbacks. All I hear about is the "challenge" that law students are all are so desperate to experience. They tell me "I have no life...since I was on law review the only calls I get are from telemarketers...I can rest when I'm dead!!!"

While you are looking away, I'm rolling my eyes at all of this. Ladies, you all but explicitly state that you will drop to your knees if I make you an offer. Gentlemen, you sit at these recruiting lunches and make unsolicited promises that you would kill your own mother for a shot at the brass ring. You bore me with guarantees that you will rape a nun for the opportunity to work for us. And we don’t want that!!! We just want you to work 80 hours a week for a few years like everyone on Wall Street, Washington, Madison Avenue and Hollywood. After a few years, you can have a great material standard of living and the time and resources to figure out what you really what to contribute to humanity.

Remember: we don't come to law schools and capture law students and chain them together and return them to our firm to work for free. You are nothing if not smart. So why then does your "research" of the law firm amount to the same, lame perusal of our web site 15 minutes before the interview. Why don't you talk to EX ASSOCIATES before accepting the FUCKING JOB!!!!

We pay you $175K a year. That's good money by anyone's standards. You come here out of school and you know NOTHING that will cause the slightest tick on the DOW JONES INDUSTRIAL AVERAGE. You know about the Rule Against Perpetuities and Future Interests. I have never had a client to come into my office and ask about future interests. They want real answers to questions about how ERISA and the INCOME TAX code will affect them in various scenarios. They want real, finite, usable answers to real, pressing problems. (i.e. "Yes" or "No" or "13.2") Not your typically sniveling, rhetorical, law- school, pontificating. My junior partners wade through reams and reams of your callow, craven prose to fashion usable, timely answers to real questions that our clients pose.

Half of you are only using this firm to pass the bar, find a husband or transition into a cushy 9-5 in-house counsel position at a Fortune 500 Company. Do you think we are stupid!!!?? The only thing we DON'T know is WHICH HALF any of you nutless wonders belongs to.

Among the other half who sincerely wants to be here and make a go of the law, we find the usual statistical array of talents, abilities and interest. Quick, name your 3 favorite movies. Got them in your mind? Good. Just as you have your favorite movies, we have our favorite associates. I wonder if what is not happening is that you are taking it personally like an actress who is just not right for a particular part. You might be sensing that you are not right for this part and getting that feedback (or lack thereof) from our firms and you are taking it personally.

Our nuts are in the vise not yours. So pardon us if you are not at the center of the universe. Neither are we. At the law firm, the CLIENT RULES.

Thank you for your time.