1L spring semester and ASS syndrome

Okay, so again, until the other day, I hadn’t posted at all since around Christmas. I didn’t post one single time during 1L spring semester. I feel like I should at least reference it now. I mean, after all, it happened.

It’s like this. The 1L fall semester can be pretty terrifying and overwhelming and exciting and inspiring and lots of other things–did I mention overwhelming?–all at once. You don’t really know what to expect as far as how to study, what to study, when to study, what will be tested, and so forth. You may get involved in student organizations, you learn how to do legal research and writing, you have happy hours, and everything is just new and shiny. The whole semester kind of just whizzes by in a blur of panic and adrenaline. Then you have exams. After grades come out, you get to see whether your study techniques were on target or not. Then you open Christmas presents or celebrate the winter holiday however you do, and all is right with the world. Yay law school.

In contrast, at least for me, the spring semester was, well, just the opposite. With the spring semester came this weird sickness that will henceforth be named Apathy of Spring Semester (ASS). Whereas the fall semester was just 16 weeks long, the spring semester was more like 457 weeks long, give or take a couple. I started out enjoying my classes, and then I just lost interest somewhere around the 32nd week of the semester. For one thing, having an 8:00 class (Property) four days a week is just simply not conducive to learning. I felt like a zombie every single day in there. The professor was engaging and easy to listen to, so it wasn’t his fault at all. For me, it’s just physiologically impossible to drink enough coffee to be fully awake for Property at 8 a.m. Four. Days. A. Week. So there’s that.

But it wasn’t just me. Most of my classmates seemed to be having the same problem with ASS syndrome. In Legal Practice (the research and writing class), we had a pretrial brief as our first assignment, and I don’t think anybody even started working on the draft more than a couple of days before it was due. Definitely not my best effort. And then there was Moot Court. Lots of people participated and lots of them us didn’t prepare as well as they we could’ve because of this horrible affliction with ASS syndrome. We also had a Mock Trial competition but I didn’t even attempt to participate in it. The last major hurdle before exams was the appellate brief, but thankfully by that time I was sick and tired of being sick and tired and I did put a decent amount of effort into writing that.

As it turns out, the only known cure for ASS syndrome is removing the afflicted person from the source of the infection, which, of course, is law school itself. So a steady diet of sleeping late, watching TV (Netflix instant watch is my BFF for life), reading fiction, and eating ice cream is just what the doctor ordered, and that’s exactly what I’ve been doing. I know, I know. It’s a hard life.

All of this is to say that really you should be glad I didn’t post at all during last semester because I have a feeling those posts would’ve all been whiny emo whiner posts and nobody wants to read that kind of crap all the time. So really I was doing you guys a favor. Yes, that’s it. You’re welcome.