It was twenty years ago this week that I put down two days of food for Annie & Cissie (my cats), and packed up my sad navy blue Ford Escort for what would be a long and life changing trip to the Elm City. Twenty years ago this week, I sat for the Connecticut bar exam. I took the Connecticut exam because I believed – during a time when the economy was lousy – that I, as a graduate of Western New England College School of Law in Springfield would have a far better chance of landing a job in the Constitution/Nutmeg state than competing with unemployed graduates and recently displaced attorneys in either Boston or New York. I was right. Sort of. That however, is for another day.
I stayed at the hotel where the exam was administered: the Park Plaza. Having roots in Massachusetts, and being quite familiar with Boston, I assumed that the Park Plaza in New Haven would be an elegant and hospitable place to take the bar exam where I would have all – if not more – than the comforts of home (which was, at that time, a studio apartment in Springfield that had no elevator, a used and incredibly fickle air conditioner and a slight cockroach problem).
I was dreadfully wrong.
I checked into my room. It had – I kid you not – deep-pile rust and orange shag carpeting, a love seat that looked – and I think I am being polite here by using this description – a tad discolored, and a bed with a mattress that appeared and ultimately felt as if it had not been changed or even flipped since the room was first decorated – which I assumed by the looks of the drapes was 1972. I missed my studio apartment already.
Day one was awful. The first day was the multiple choice multi-state exam. That night, I dined with my friend and colleague Susan Williams, and our dear friend and law school classmate, the late Bill Sassi. The three of us were utterly exhausted, and I think I started to get a little manic. It was one of those things that learning to practice law can instill in you: the fear that you have done something horribly wrong that will have far reaching consequences that can affect peoples lives. In this case, it would be failing the bar exam – or at least doing really bad on the first day – and at that time, failing it meant even greater uncertainty in getting a job.
I recall some ridiculous question being asked by one of us: “Do you guys remember that question about the cop who cuffed the driver of the car after pulling him over for a broken tail light and he did not read him his rights after he found the weapon under the newspaper which was stuff under the passenger’s seat?” (ok, I admit: it was me).
“Was that the one where one of the answers was ‘yes, the arrest was valid but the gun was inadmissible?’” one of them replied.
“Yea, what was the answer on that?”
There was this awkward silence. And then, one of them said with total seriousness and respect: “uh, B” Bill and Susan then looked at each other, nodded and then looked at me with big smiles and said almost in unison: “The answer was B.” And then we all laughed.
Then, over what I am pretty sure was really bad Mexican food, we went through a litany of questions where we would take turns throwing out random letters as answers. As we laughed, and as we complained that the sodas we were drinking would not the real drinks we knew we’d be drinking after the exam tomorrow, the tension of that day slowly started to fade.
After dinner, we walked around downtown New Haven, and took a short jaunt through parts of the Yale campus before heading back to the hotel as the summer sun began to set. We retired back to our respective rooms. I heard the sirens, and I put it out of my head, trying to stay focused on day two of the exam. Ultimately, I did not sleep well. I recall later learning that there was some hideously violent crime literally outside the hotel’s front door that night.
Day two was the essay portion of the exam. I recall there being 12 essays – each a 1/2 hour to answer them. If my memory serves me right, you could write all you wanted in that 1/2 hour period – but at the end of the 1/2 hour, you had to start with another essay. By lunch, my arm was sore and my hand felt as if it could not write any more. The last essay was on professional responsibility – what we lawyers call ethics. I handed in my blue answer book, grabbed my stuff and headed out.
The rest is really a blur. I have almost no memory of getting into my car and getting back on I-91. I remember feeling particularly numb while on the drive back to Springfield. I remember at times singing to songs on the radio thinking how my summer could finally begin. I remember feeling at times completely panic-stricken that I had missed something, or that I answered something wrong. It would only be later that I would learn that not only were my feelings proven wrong, but the fact that I was feeling them might actually make me a better lawyer. (Ok, maybe not necessarily the hysterical crying fits I had while sitting in Hartford traffic as I wondered why the hell I went to law school in the first place since I had no job, no money, had to wait a few months before exam results and at that time, the economy was lousy and no one was hiring. That, I’ll just chalk that up to exhaustion.)
Related posts:
- 20/5: I, (State your name, please), do solemnly swear…
- Credit Fueled Drunken Debauchery
- Gambling, Gamblers and Bankruptcy
- 20/5: This journey started 20 years ago tomorrow
- Blackberries & Form-Fillers: What Bankruptcy Practice is Really About
Tags: The 20-5 Series