Things have hit full swing.

On the first day of orientation, the IU Dean of Student Affairs flatly told us, “Some days you’re just going to say ‘law school sucks’…I’d just say go with it for a while.” He also told us, in all seriousness, that 40% of law students deal with serious depression during the time they’re in school. Yikes. I plan to be in the 60%, but that’s an intimidatingly high number. If nothing else, it probably means that I’ll have a front row seat to some unfortunate personality transformations. Let’s hope not though.

In any case, classes started full-time last Wednesday. Everything in Bloomington is way different now than it was during the summer. The population has quadrupled (or whatever…but I think that’s about what it’s done), traffic is hideous, weather is turning to fall (and is absolutely glorious, though we’re getting much cooler mornings now), and the law school no longer belongs to us summer starters. There are now hundreds upon hundreds of law students; I don’t recognize most 2Ls, I recognize exactly zero 3Ls, and I’m probably not up to knowing half of my own class by name yet. I like a good number of fall starters, a select few have made pretty bad impressions on me, most I’m either neutral toward or I simply don’t know at all. One of the faculty mentioned during the summer that she always notices that the summer starters sort of stick together socially throughout three years of school, and it’s easy to see that it will likely be the case again here. There’s a comfort zone in finding familiar faces in every class…even summer starters that I was neutral toward are a welcome sight. In the summer, we all had plenty of time to do a number of social functions and we know each other really well as a result, and it’s obvious that there simply won’t be as much time to do those things anymore. I did, however, buy my Hoosier season tickets for football (just six games…for a grand total of $30), and have some friends who want to go, so I’ve got that to look forward to. Home opener on Thursday night, I’m excited even though the team is really not particularly good.

Things are busy with class…all the time. There’s always more I could be doing, I don’t think it’s really possible to say that you’ve done all you possibly could. You can say that you’ve done your required reading for the night, but you could be reading on supplements, working ahead so that you would have some hope of keeping all the way up on the reading for a while longer (eventually it will just become impossible to be fully caught up on all reading; someone said it best when they suggested that reading every page assigned to you would require a mix of insanity and stimulants; you have to learn what’s important to read and what can be de-prioritized). Early in the semester, things aren’t as bad because outlining for the final isn’t yet in the picture. Things will eventually ramp up in any case; I’ve been working ahead toward my Friday classes so that I can fully enjoy Thursday’s football game and just not worry about any school after I get out of class that day.

Basic rundown of the classes…
Civil Procedure: Relatively enjoyable, despite the dry subject of procedure. The prof is very engaging, easy to listen to and presents his lectures in an organized format that I really appreciate. He gave by far the best speech at orientation (which was a painful event as you could expect) and has a talent for the whole public speaking thing. I have him for my earliest morning class, so I’m glad he’s not boring at least.

Criminal Law: The reading for this class is some of the most engaging I’ll get in law school, I think. Fascinating stuff. The professor, despite having attended law school at University of Washington, is really engaging and interesting. He’s entirely uncharismatic as a public speaker, but he really knows how to conduct a class-wide discussion that gets you thinking. This is my early candidate for favorite class.

Criminal Procedure: Same professor as Criminal Law. Unfortunately it feels like I go to crim law and enjoy it, then I go to lunch and come back and he’s boring. The subject matter is pretty dry, and he does more straight lecturing without involving the class as much here. It’s pretty difficult to listen to him drone on. Interesting at times, but probably my least favorite class after one week. We’re also in this class with 2Ls and 3Ls, which is a dynamic I don’t love.

Contracts: The professor for this class is a grumpy old curmudgeon, and I seriously love him for it. He’s hilarious…but his grumpiness is real, and he’s the scariest one as far as not wanting professors to call on you. He’ll haul off on anyone. I had done all of the required reading for class yesterday, and as I watched him grill one student I thought, “Uhh, yeah, I’m really not ready to be called on, I couldn’t handle these questions.” He’ll eventually call on me, and whatever happens happens, getting grilled in class and looking stupid doesn’t hurt your grade. He’s the prototypical scary law professor that you might imagine though, grilling people with Socratic method and all of that. If you’ve seen The Paper Chase, this guy is the closest thing to that professor. Hilarious moment from class on Monday…my classmate from summer start who raises his hand all class long in every single class (and as such is sort of annoying to be in class with, though he’s a cool guy who I sometimes hang out with outside of class) raised his hand at the beginning of this professor’s lecture. The professor just looked up and said, “What, is your hand just still up from last time?” I laughed at the time, but after it died down I really had a hard time stifling for a really long time. It just felt good to see someone talk to this classmate so bluntly. I couldn’t get it out of my head and was afraid I was going to start cracking up again five minutes later. Thankfully I held it together.

Legal Writing: I like this professor a lot, he’s really young (just got his law degree four years ago) and relatable. I have him the same day that I have the grumpy old man in contracts, it’s a pretty interesting contrast of styles. This class isn’t as important since it’s graded pass/fail, it meets less often, it just isn’t a huge deal…but I do think it will teach me some good applicable legal skills.

Anyway, I’m up far too late due to a nap I took today, and I’m only looking at getting four hours of sleep tonight, so I’d better get going. Just wanted to check in and give an update. Summary: things are going well here. Different, and harder, but not bad. I’m still happy here, and I still feel lucky to be getting to do this. Having direction and feeling productive are wonderful things, and more than negate any bad feelings I could have toward the excessive workload.