A Squirrel's Escape, and the Best Ice Cream Ever

As I carried my laundry back from the washroom at my apartment complex on Friday morning, out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of a grey blur darting past me through the grass.

I turned and saw that the blur was in fact a squirrel, running full speed toward a large pine tree.

What was amazing was how fast this creature was moving. I've seen squirrels scurry away from me when I approached them. I've seen them run and hop out of the way of cars on the road, and I've seen them run from each other in the trees.

But this squirrel was not moving like that. Its tail was stiff, and it did not hop at all as it sprinted. Every muscle in its body seemed to be focused on generating speed and in keeping a beeline for that pine tree. It shot through the grass like an efficient, low flying bullet.

I thought, I've never seen a squirrel move like that. I've never seen a squirrel move that fast in my life.

But a second later, I understood why it was moving with such concentrated urgency.

All of a sudden, a magnificent hawk descended from the sky, its wings spread wide and talons outstretched. It came in right behind the squirrel and flew within a couple of inches of the tail.

The squirrel proved to be fast enough, though. It made it to the base of the tree. The hawk had to land short to keep from hitting the tree, but the squirrel hit it going full speed and disappeared around the other side of the trunk.

The hawk stood on the ground for less than two seconds before it flew up to perch on a nearby clothes line pole. It looked around, and then studied me for a few seconds before flying off.

The hawk did not stay still long enough for me to get a good look at its features other than its white and brown underside. It was probably either a red shouldered hawk or a red tail hawk. The squirrel escaped, but I do not know if it later succumbed to a heart attack...

After finishing my laundry, I headed out to the law school for "Admitted Students' Day." Each spring, FSU Law hosts such a day to entice those high quality applicants who have been fortunate enough to gain acceptance as part of the incoming fall class. As a law school ambassador, it was my job to give a tour of the campus facilities and resources. I did my best to convince these prospects that if they are committed to going to law school, then enrolling at FSU would be a good choice.

After the tour ended, I took the students to the law school rotunda where they were serving "Marble Slab" ice cream. I had never tasted Marble Slab ice cream before, and I got in line behind dozens of others who were waiting to be served. I felt sorry for the worker doing all the dipping, but he must have had very strong wrists and hands.

When it was my turn, I ordered vanilla ice cream with a cookie dough topping. The server scooped what I thought was a rather small portion of vanilla, and then literally put it on a cold marble slab in front of him. With two spatula-type instruments, he kneaded the cookie dough into the ice cream.

As I watched him work, I noted that the ice cream itself had more the density of a paste or a dough than the cream I was used to. It did not break up as he worked with it. After a few moments, the server put the ice cream in a paper cup and gave it to me with a spoon.

When I tasted it, I decided immediately that this was the best ice cream I had ever had in my life. The thickness and richness also made the serving much larger than I thought. One cup filled me up. I did not go back for seconds, despite it being the most delicious ice cream I had ever tasted.

This Marble Slab ice cream beat a longstanding record. Previously, the best ice cream I had ever eaten was on a summer day in Wake Forest, North Carolina, when I was about five years old. I was living at my grandmother's house, and all my cousins from that side of the family were there, along with my parents and my brother. I played in the yard with my cousins while the adults all sat around and talked.

The adults also set about making homemade chocolate ice cream, which we were all eager to taste. I remember my dad turning the churn by hand for what seemed like forever.

When it was finally ready, I remember how delicious and cold it tasted. Like the Marble Slab, the texture of that chocolate ice cream was different from any other I've ever had, too.

In later years, we made homemade ice cream again at family gatherings, but it was with an electric churn that did not need to be turned by hand. It was also never quite as good as that first time in Wake Forest.

The Marble Slab ice cream that I had on Friday was better, though. Here is a link to their business:

http://www.marbleslab.com/

After I finished eating it in the law school rotunda, I went to watch Florida State's baseball team take on Wake Forest at Dick Howser stadium. Wake Forest University's campus used to be in that town of the same name where I once lived with my grandmother and ate homemade ice cream for the first time, but the university moved to Winston-Salem some years before I was born.

It was an enjoyable day.

Until Next Time,

Nathan Marshburn

The Flub

Earlier this week, the professor in one of my classes created a neat game to help us understand the practical aspects of some of the broader ideas and themes of the course.

She passed out a sheet with the instructions and problems, and gave us a few minutes to think over our answers. Then she took out a football.

The professor randomly tossed it to one of the students in the class. After he caught it, she told him to answer the first problem on the instruction sheet. After he did so, she told him to throw the ball to another student.

As soon as that first student answered the problem, I knew I was in trouble.

I had completely misunderstood the directions, and my answers were way off from what the professor was looking for. No sooner did I realize this when the football was in the air again, heading right at me.

I didn’t catch it. I ducked out of the way and let the ball land with a hard “BAM!” on the table in front of me. It bounced to the floor.

Everyone in the class went silent and just stared at me. The ball rolled ever so slowly to the middle of the class.

I mumbled something about an incomplete pass or a fumble, but it got no laughs. The professor looked at me with a blank expression.

I stood up, walked to the center of the room, picked up the ball, and returned to my seat.

Everyone was waiting. I stared down at my paper for a moment. Eventually, I said that I had misunderstood the instructions, and read off my totally irrelevant answer.

Everyone was still waiting. But I had nothing, and there wasn’t enough time to think. For the first time in my law school career, I froze.

Crickets chirping.

Finally, the professor offered me the dreaded, “tail tucked between my legs” escape that I had heard offered to other students in other classes a few times before:

“Would you like the assistance of co-counsel?”

I quickly answered, “Yes.”

Law school goal #8: Go the entire three years without embarrassing myself when called on in class/ Always be prepared and never have to ask for “the assistance of co-counsel.”

Result of law school goal #8: Fail.

One of my friends sitting behind me offered to take a “lateral.”

I tossed the ball back to him, nearly knocking over his water bottle in the process.

The rest of the class went on with the game, tossing the ball back and forth and giving the correct answers. Apparently, I was the only one who had misunderstood the directions.

After class ended and I was walking out, the professor gave me a smile of what I took to be pity.

It was a nice start to the day.

Hopefully, I won't have a similar misunderstanding when the professor passes out the instructions on final exam day.

Beware the Ides of March,

Nathan Marshburn

The Last Resume Goals

The last remaining goals for my law school resume are to make the Dean's List one more time and then, more importantly, graduate with honors. Right now, my GPA puts me in that position, but it is close and I am trying to hold it.

Because of the law school curve system, a grade in the 80s is actually not bad, compared to the rest of the student body. For example, only 3% of the students in a given class may receive a grade of 98 to 100. The professor does not have to give anyone such a grade if he or she so chooses. 5% to 15% of the class may receive a grade from 93 to98, 10% to 25% may receive grades from 86 to 92, and so forth.

Right now, my GPA is 85 point something. While this would have sounded horrible to me in high school or as an undergraduate in college, it actually places me inside the top 25% of my class in law school (There is also an "upper level" GPA that excludes first year courses, but I am not sure this figure is relevant for graduation honors).

An average of 86 or better during a given semester will earn you a spot on the Dean's List. If your overall GPA is higher than 84 when you finish law school, then you graduate Cum Laude.

Grades have been my primary focus during law school. I have not held a job during the school year so that I could spend more time on academics. The Mock Trial Team has been my second highest priority, but I have not done much above the minimum membership requirements for that organization, and I have only competed in the minimum number of required tournaments.

This is not the story for many of my colleagues. Some have families to support or otherwise need the money, and thus do not have the luxury of using only loans to get them through school.

Another group of students elect to work during the school year with the hope of making connections that will lead to a full time job. Landing a career job, after all, is the end game here. There are two basic ways to get a career job: 1) Through outstanding grades and extracurricular accomplishments, or 2) by making a connection with a person who can open a door. A few of my friends took jobs as part time clerks at law firms after becoming frustrated with their grades.

Given the amount of time that I have devoted to classes and studying, I would like my GPA to be higher than 85 point something. But there it is. We will see if it was worth not trying to make connections by working during the school year, or enhancing my resume by putting more effort into the Mock Trial Team.

If I held a job during the school year, my grades would take a big hit. If I had competed in more Mock Trial tournaments or held an office in the organization, my grades would take a hit.

Last year, I had a conversation with the newly elected president of one of the major law school organizations. She also worked as a clerk at a law firm, and had family issues that took up a lot of her time.

I asked her, "How are you going to do all that and still keep decent grades?"

She replied, "My game plan is to land a job before my grades crash."

But the real wonders are the students who have other major time commitments and still make the top grades in school. Some of my friends hold an office on the Law Review, the school's most prestigious student organization, in addition to having a part time job, in addition to being a member of other premier law school organizations. And yet they will graduate Magna Cum Laude or Summa Cum Laude.

What can I say? More power to them. I've done the best I could in law school. It is too expensive to come here and not try hard. If I had law school to do over, I really would not do much differently. At least that is my thinking right now. Perhaps I would make more of an effort to join the Law Review, though I know I would not have enjoyed the work that is required of its members. I also might make more of an effort to publish a paper, though again, this would not have been enjoyable.

In order to graduate from FSU Law, every student has to take a "paper class" and write a paper of publishable quality. The paper is your grade in lieu of a final exam. I worked very hard in my "paper class," and it turned out pretty well. That paper got me one of my highest grades in law school. It was the first law school class that I ever "booked." Writing that darn paper was also the most exhausting experience I've had in law school. It was the first time in my life that I ever wrote something substantial using only a computer. Normally, I hand write everything first and then type it up (a system that would be completely unacceptable in a law firm that utilizes the billable hour model). By the time I finished my final draft, I had stared at a computer screen for so long and hard, bounced back and forth so much between my paper and Westlaw or LexisNexis, that my eyes literally felt like two golf balls bouncing around inside my skull. The dizzying sensation stayed with me for about three days.

So, it was not a close decision about whether or not I would try to write a second paper in law school (as is required of Law Review members).

But some of the best students here actually enroll in all the paper classes they can. They prefer writing papers to taking final exams. Again, more power to them.

Three final exams remain for me. One exam is scheduled for the day before the graduation ceremony. The chances to distinguish myself and tag my resume with law school accolades have almost entirely come and gone, now. I've had successes and failures, but I've given my maximum effort short of making myself miserable.

I hope I can perform well enough on these last exams to hold the line and always be able to put "graduated with honors" out beside my degree.

Until Next Time,

Nathan Marshburn

Three Directions

I was watching a game on TV one day when Lee Corso, an ESPN college football analyst who played for Florida State said, "Life is about change, and your ability to adapt to it."

In my first semester of law school, I readily made the change to this new environment and to living in my small apartment in Alumni Village. School has always been enjoyable and an easy adjustment for me. But an even bigger change is coming in just a few months- after I graduate and take the bar exam. I am trying to get ready for it. The difficulty is figuring out exactly how I need to change. It can be mentally exhausting. Job openings in this economy are scarce. Interviews are even scarcer. If I get an interview, I need to wow the employer. I need to hit a home run.

My experiences in law school have shown me a few things that I do not want to do. For example, working under the billable hour system is not for me. I will not bother going into details as to why I dislike that system, but unfortunately, this aversion wipes out many avenues of employment. Most law firms utilize the billable hour model.

I've managed to narrow my thinking about the future to three directions, each of which requires a very different mindset. In no particular order of preference, they are:

1) Plaintiff's Civil Litigation Attorney:

I would be good at this.

Much of my focus during law school has been in developing skills as a trial lawyer and a knowledge base in personal injury/wrongful death/workers’ compensation practice.

Personal injury, workers’ comp and wrongful death became primary choices for practice in large part due to my experience as a law clerk with Parks & Crump, LLC in Tallahassee. It is much more satisfying to see the face of the client I represent, to know them as a person, and to fight and win a personal victory for them. I would not be happy working for the other side, billing hours day after day to a faceless client, helping (in the words of Mr. Crump) Goliath defeat David.

In order to succeed in this field, though, I need to take on more "walking around stress" than I have as a student. To be a good advocate, I have to be willing to go into fights for my clients on a daily basis. My clients' cases will always be one of if not the single most important thing in their lives at that given time. My clients will put a lot of hope in me. The partners of the firm, my fellow attorneys, the paralegals, will all have expectations of me. Their livelihood will depend on how I perform. To take on this kind of responsibility and high stakes gamesmanship will require disciplined thinking on my part. I will have to become a somewhat different person than I am now.

To succeed in job interviews for a plaintiff's civil litigation attorney, I need to already be thinking like this. I need to get ready.

2) Criminal Defense Attorney/ Public Defender

I would be good at this.

Back on September 10, 2010, I wrote a blog entry about my pro bono work with the Leon County Public Defender. It was an enjoyable experience.

In order to be a successful criminal defense attorney in private practice, you almost have to put in your time with a Public Defender's Office or State Attorney's Office. Many people make careers there, particularly in the Public Defender's Office. The "walking around stress" would be cut down some, as the state will take care of my salary and the livelihoods of my support staff. Criminal law is more fun than the civil side, too. On the other hand, I would be in court a lot more. Parks & Crump typically goes to trial only about twice per year. As a public defender, though, I will have the daily stress of almost literally holding a person's life in my hands. The words I say to a jury, how I act in front of them and the judge, will decide if my client (guilty or innocent) goes free, goes to prison, or perhaps goes to the lethal injection table. To get ready for this job, I need more independent study of criminal law and procedure. Most of my electives in law school have been to help me prepare as a civil litigator. I never took Criminal Procedure-Adjudication ("From Bail to Jail"); I never took Dean Logan's legendary Criminal Procedure-Police class ("Cops and Robbers"). I also skipped the criminal pre-trial drafting courses that many students interested in this area of law took. Still, I have all the confidence I need to be successful here. More than any other area of law, I think I could quickly become competent here.

But to succeed in these job interviews, I need to already be thinking like a criminal defense attorney. I need to get ready.

3) Sales in the legal field.

I would be good at this.

There is a possible option to not practice law altogether and instead go into a sales career, either with the bar prep company which I now work for as a student, or with the publishing and internet research giants used by law schools and law firms- Wolters Kluwer, LexisNexis or Westlaw.

I already possess many of the fundamental skills necessary for success in sales, though it did not come naturally. By nature, I am an introvert, but my experience in auto sales before coming to law school opened up a new world and a new way of thinking to me. After a few months practice, I finally began to instinctively see a situation and think, "Now what would the good salesman do?"

The mindset needed to be successful in sales is what I already have to a large extent, but it is a 180 degree turn from what I need to be a successful trial lawyer. In sales, it is not good practice to dislike anyone. Anyone. But for a trial lawyer, there are different rules.

For example, earlier this semester, I had to prepare for a Mock Trial tournament. Our case was a criminal one, a murder trial. I was the prosecutor, and my chief assignments were to tear up the defendant (an accused throat slasher) on cross examination and then tear him up again in my closing argument before the jury.

In getting my mind ready, in drafting my cross examination questions and in practicing how I would say them, I was aware that it was affecting my job as a sales rep for my bar prep company. I was not as friendly to people. I did not bother studying them as much to pay attention to their likes and dislikes. I also was surprised when I began forgetting some students' names. In sales, I learned tricks to remember peoples' names. But in getting ready for this trial, the tricks faded in my mind, and so did the names. I was thinking instead about how to get the jury angry with the defendant, about how to make the jury feel moral revulsion over what he had done.

Now that the Mock Trial tournament is over, I am good to go for sales interviews again. But if I start to get ready for other types of interviews, criminal law or civil litigation, I will lose this edge...

All right, that's enough complaining. I am graduating from a top 50 law school in two months. I am in much better shape than most people.

It would just be less tiring to know exactly how I should be training my mind right now. As it is, I worry about being mediocre or indecisive in interviews. But we'll see where I land.

Until Next Time,

Nathan Marshburn

Birmingham and Mock Trial

Today in Tallahassee, I found pollen on my car for the first time this year. I also turned on the air conditioner in my car for the first time since September or October. During my drive to school, I saw a dogwood tree in full bloom. I am glad that the cold weather is fading away...

And last weekend, I had the privilege of competing in my final Mock Trial tournament. I was part of a team that Florida State Law sent to the Texas Young Lawyer's Association (TYLA) regional competition. This tournament is one of if not the most popular Mock Trial tournaments in the country. It is a national event, with many of the law schools in the country sending a team to their respective regional contest. Our region includes Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi. The regional winners go on to Houston in April for the finals.

The Cumberland School of Law in Birmingham served as this year's regional host. The city has a beautiful courthouse where all the teams competed. My team did fairly well. We beat Barry University, the University of Miami, and lost a close contest to the University of Alabama. Our 2-1 record wasn't quite good enough to reach the semifinals, so we were done with the competition on Saturday night.

This gave us the opportunity to see a little of the city. During our trip, we stayed at the Sheraton in downtown Birmingham. On Saturday night, Kid Rock performed right across the street. To my surprise, he has quite a following. Kid Rock groupies filled up the rooms of the hotel, and well before the concert began my hall was littered with beer bottles and empty cigarette boxes. I enjoyed mingling with the fans before I hit the town Saturday night. I was used to their thick southern accents, but to hear guys speaking the southern working class dialect while wearing all black and eyeliner was a bit unique.

When we left the hotel, my teammates and I took a cab to a section of town called "The Five Points." This area had a good feel to it. We discovered a cool little place called The Blue Monkey Lounge tucked at the end of a cobblestone street. My teammates' company, the atmosphere, the music, the drinks, and the women there were fantastic. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and all of us, I think, appreciated blowing off some steam. If I am ever in Birmingham again, "The Five Points" is a place to which I would return. Here is a link to the Blue Monkey Lounge website: http://bluemonkeylounge.com/

As far as the competition itself, my only regret is that I did not get a chance to go in more trials. Each time I compete, I feel myself getting stronger, getting better. I was conscious of how good I felt once the trial got going. Sure, I was nervous before and during the competition. That will probably always be there, and sometimes the nerves show through a bit. But I was also aware of my confidence. It is not an overstatement to say that for certain flashes during the trial, I felt invincible.

That feeling, that rush, is the best thing the Mock Trial Team has given me. I have learned and continue to learn a lot about how trials work and what I need to do to win. And, foolishly or not, I now believe that I can beat anyone in a courtroom on a given day... Bring in the top trial lawyers in the country. I'll go head to head with them. Bring in anyone with style and presence: President Obama, Johnny Depp, Tom Cruise from A Few Good Men, I'll take on whomever walks into the courtroom. This is silly boasting, I know, but it is really a great, rare feeling when this kind of rush hits me before or during a trial.

Anyway, my Mock Trial competition days are over, and I am a little sad about that. I think that if there was a 4L year in law school, I would stop focusing so much on my grades and instead compete in as many tournaments as I could. Once you really start learning what to do, Mock Trial can become addictive.

Until Next Time,

Nathan Marshburn

Preparing for the Practice of Law

My decision to go to law school was a way to hit the reset button on my life. I was not happy with the direction I was going, and I wanted to learn skills that would make me more valuable in society- a trade that would make me more employable.

Prior to law school, the closest I had come to learning a trade was sales. I had also worked for the Post Office, but this simply involved brute manual labor. Working for the Post Office did nothing to prepare me for any sort of other job.

Sales was a fascinating experience, though. I took a job with a car dealership in Las Vegas. Management put me out on the lot, and the veteran salesmen were amused to watch me crash and burn with one customer after another. It was clear to everyone that I had no idea what I was doing. But I was paid totally on commission, so I was only really hurting my own wallet. Management watched me, though. If I got a qualified buyer in and seemed to be making progress, they would send over one of the three or four "closers" who worked there to make sure the deal got done. One closer, a sharp guy named Rod who was originally from Hawaii, would actually kick me under the table if I said something wrong to a customer.

Sales was a complete fog to me at first, but I eventually began to learn some things through failed experience, watching what the veterans did, and reading a very good book on selling.

I continued to work in auto sales after I made the decision to return to school. Ironically, in the five or six months in between my decision to go back to school and the start of classes, I became pretty good at my job. It was probably due in part to the fact that I was more relaxed. I had made my decision. There was no need to push too hard, as I knew I was leaving soon.

Anyway, management began letting me close my own deals. During one of our weekly sales meetings, a manager had me stand up. He told the group that my progress over the past few months had been tremendous, and he wanted me to share the secret of my success with them. I said that I simply found a part of the deal that I believed in. I got excited about it, and I tried to convey that excitement to the customer...

Now, less than three months from graduation from law school, I find myself trying to learn a new trade again. The practice of law will be far different from law school . Law school gives you some fundamental tools, but school is largely a world unto itself. There are also certain similarities between the practice of law and the art of selling, but there is no doubt that I have to get myself into a new mindset. Here are two of the most stark adjustments I am trying to make:

1) Changing the importance of being a nice guy.

In sales, "Make the customer like you" is a cardinal rule if not the most important rule of all. My sales performance improved once I began thinking of the business as "the science of being liked." You never argue with a customer in sales. You may win the argument, but you will lose the sale.

In law, I am not convinced that being a nice guy is important. Sure, you should always be courteous and polite. But your client is not hiring you to be a nice guy. Your client is hiring you to win their legal argument. Particularly in trial law, I think this holds true. Many of the trial lawyers I am meeting strike me as being confident to the point of arrogance. I do not hold this against them. You almost have to be arrogant and stubborn to be successful. Time and again in law school, I have heard that law is an adversarial system, and I've seen a little of how contentious it can get. If I am always being humble, trying to adhere to the science of being liked, then I am probably not serving my client very well.

In sales, ideally you want the whole process to be so smooth and pleasant for everyone involved that the same customer will come back to you again and again and also send you referrals.

But in trial law, you want to inspire fear- or at least hesitation- in the other side. There are some great lines from the movie, The Verdict, starring Paul Newman. Newman plays Frank Galvin, an attorney representing a woman in a coma due to the medical negligence of a Catholic hospital.

At one one point in the movie, another attorney, Mickey, asks him, "Do you know who the attorney for the Archdiocese is? Eddie Concannon."

Galvin replies, "He's a good man."

Mickey: "He's a good man?! He's the F***ing Prince of Darkness! He'll have people in there testifying that they saw this broad Tuesday on a surfboard in Hyannis!"

...Hopefully, in sales no one ever calls you the F***ing Prince of Darkness.

2) Eye wear.

Repetitive motion jobs take their toll on parts of the body. I observed this in the mail carriers I worked with and the health problems that they experienced.

If you're going to be a lawyer, you might as well resign yourself to the toll all the reading off computer screens is going to take on your eyes. Several people I know have had to get glasses or stronger prescriptions since coming to law school. My own vision has slightly worsened- though not to the point where I need glasses (my dominant performance at table tennis over the Christmas break convinced me that I don't need glasses, yet).

Losing my eyesight has always been a big fear. I always thought that people who wore glasses could not see anything beyond a certain range- that it all literally turned to black after 500 yards or so. As my own vision has suffered some wear, though, I am relieved to learn that vision loss does not quite work that way. I can still perceive color from far away.

One day, I was looking down Jefferson Street at a stoplight. It had to be over 500 yards distant. The light looked like a fuzzy prism and had no clear borders. I thought to myself, "Now, three years ago I would have been able to see the circle of that light clearly. It would not be fuzzy."

But I could still see the change from green to yellow to red.

That's good enough, I guess. As long as I can perceive color and light from as far away as I always have, and as long as I can clearly focus on things close to me, I'll take it.

In sales, this was obviously not a problem. I was outside on the car lot most of the time, and got to stretch my eyes, so to speak, by looking at the mountains on the horizon outside of Vegas. Or I could look up at the huge tower of the Stratosphere casino. Planes also came in for a landing right over our dealership. I could see strange white passenger airliners with no markings on them but a red stripe down each side. Rod, the closer from Hawaii, told me that those planes carried the employees of Area 51 back and forth. They landed at a location called JANET at the airport, which stood for "Just another non-existent terminal." Who knows if Rod was telling me the truth.

There are other changes to my mindset worth noting, but this entry has already taken too much time. I need to get back to studying Complex Civil Litigation.

Until Next Time,

Nathan Marshburn

3L Stress

Beginning last semester, and increasing this semester, I sense a new kind of stress among some of my fellow students graduating with me in May. The tension is completely related, I believe, to the pressure of finding a job.

Florida State Law has an outstanding career placement record- perhaps better than any of the other ten law schools in this state. We will all land jobs eventually. But the current condition of the economy has hit almost every occupational area hard. The legal field is no exception. Fewer of the big law firms are hiring. It is harder than in years past, I think.

I am feeling the stress a little myself- not so much because I'm worried about finding a job. There is always room for a good lawyer, and I have the tools to become a great trial lawyer. Even if it is September before I get a job, one is coming. The stress, for me, arises from not knowing exactly what the next chapter is, along with hoping I do not rush into a situation where I will be unhappy- while at the same time making sure that I do not pass up a golden opportunity. Also, there is the peer pressure. Many of my friends are in the top 10% of the class. Most of these students do in fact already have jobs lined up. When they ask me where I am going and what I have lined up, I have to say, "I do not know, yet."

Last semester, these same top students were probably feeling a stress similar to what I am feeling now. Last semester, they were applying for judicial clerkships. A judicial clerkship is a prestigious position in which a person works for a specific judge. The judicial clerk reviews pleadings and other documents submitted to the judge for the accuracy of the legal arguments. Clerks also help judges with research and in drafting opinions. In short, clerks work side by side with the judge and do much of the heavy lifting.

For federal judicial clerkships, the top students from the best law schools submit their application materials via OSCAR (The Online System for Clerkship Application and Review). The judges then cherry pick whom they want to interview and hire. One of the best things a new lawyer can have on his or her resume is a federal clerkship. The clerkships typically last one or two years. Large law firms will be more than happy to hire a student fresh out of law school, and then hold the job for that student while he or she works as a judicial clerk for a couple of years.

Last semester, when the window on the OSCAR system opened for applications, I remember a friend posting as her Facebook status, "Let the rejections begin!" Another student commented, "Let the anxiety begin!" Both of these students received well deserved clerkships and will be working for federal judges after graduation. The FSU students who were not selected still have a wealth of options available.

Even if I had the top grades to get a foot in the door with OSCAR, I am not sure that is a job I would enjoy or one in which I would excel. You have to be tremendous at research and legal writing (and legal writing is a completely different animal from writing a blog, believe me). You must have the ability to become competent in different areas of the law in a short amount of time. Much of what we learn in law school is so complicated and related to logical reasoning that I compare it to math proofs or algebraic equations. Working as a judicial clerk, for me, would be like having to sit in a room and quickly solve proofs and equations, one right after the other, all day, every day. Judicial clerks finish their tenure with a wealth of great legal experience, especially in dealing with the arguments on paper.

I would not want to have to go up against a former federal judicial clerk in an appellate brief writing contest.

But standing in front of a six or twelve person jury at a trial- that is a different story. I am more comfortable there, and I have a lot more confidence in my ability to win. Using the law and facts to persuade a jury is much more up my alley than analyzing all sides of the legal arguments for a judge.

Anyway, we will see what happens. I think the immediate future is largely unknown for most students in my class at FSU Law. It is not unnatural for us all to feel some anxiety about that.

Until Next Time,

Nathan Marshburn