Update

• Sworn-in in NY
• Somehow I passed the CA Bar Exam
• So far taking bar exams has been the most lawyerly thing I have done since graduation

Bar Bomb!

I am going into day 3 of absolutely bombing the California Bar.

But this being the February Bar, I am in the company of so many failures that I don't feel too bad about my poor bar performance. Many conversations at my test center involve people listing the number of bars they have failed and how many times they have failed the California Bar. People in California are very open about their failures.

I have a lot of time to eavesdrop on other people's conversations because I have no friends at the testing center. The most conversation I have all day is with my test-table-buddy. We talk about how I should be embracing life before I am married with children and how it doesn't matter if I fail the CA Bar because I "have no life out here." I thought my test-table-buddy friendship was going pretty well until we started talking about how an elderly white female proctor was treating a middle-aged black male proctor. My test-table-buddy observed that the elderly white female proctor was very mean to the middle-aged black male proctor, following him around and berating him for handing out test booklets too slowly. I added that her treatment of the man was reminiscent of an overseer/slave relationship. My addition was not appreciated and I worry I destroyed my blossoming test-table-buddy friendship.

The person I talk to most after my test-table-buddy(?) is my proctor. My proctor is the NICEST man. He likes to come to my seat and have whispered conversations with me while the test is in progress. When I raise my hand an hour before time is called to tell him I am done, he says affirming things like, "When can I call you Esquire," and "You must really know your stuff to be done so soon!" No, Sir. I do not. Today, when I finished my afternoon MBE (probably too) early, he flipped through my test booklet, and then said, "I guess you read them all." Sort of!

Here is what I spend most of my test-taking time doing: alternating between internal laughter and deep despair. Laughter because this exam is nonsense and I cannot believe I am subjecting myself to it and despair because this exam is nonsense and I cannot believe I am subjecting myself to it. Yesterday, one of my best sentences read: "X is unavailable because she is dead." Because I know no rules, I am focusing on very clearly spelling out the facts for these bar examiners in hopes that they respect my reading comprehension skills.

The worst part of this bar exam is how time-consuming it is for how little effort I seem to be putting into it. I have to wake up at 5:30 a.m. to leave at 6:00 a.m. and then return home around 6:30 p.m. to eat nutella by the handful before I fall asleep unprepared for the next day. I try to give myself pep talks during the test to improve my focus. However, I don't find myself very inspiring and so inevitably leave the test early to go read O Magazine at a nearby Starbucks for two hours before the next test session begins.

At least tomorrow is the last day! I also secretly hope that this exam is 90% showing up. I can never remember the requisite percentage of that "showing up" phrase, so I just use the percentage from the phrase "90% perspiration, 10% inspiration." I wonder if that perspiration phrase is also applicable to my situation. While I perspired not at all in preparing for this test, I am really sweating my imminent failure.