How to Be a Lawyer, Part Three: Getting the Damn Thing Over With

(Part One)

(Part Two)

STEP NINE, I THINK: Summer internships are so easy a caveman could do it. Them. In fact there's only one thing you need to know: the word "right". Because you come from a prestigious law school (assuming you followed my advice), your supervisors will expect you to know something about the law. Fortunately for you, a properly inflected "right" coupled with a terse nod of the head will convince every partner you understand what they're talking about.

"All this is is a pretty simple amendment to the credit facilities. You probably saw there's a first and second lien, but they're both pretty straightforward."
"Right."
"Anyway the hard part is gonna be obtaining the two-thirds consent needed to adjust the debt coverage ratios in order for the company to avoid a default."
"Right."
"Because obviously the lenders are gonna make them pay through the nose for this."
"Right."

I swear to God, somehow this works. I don't think I said anything besides "right", "thanks", and "Glenlivet" for the first three weeks of my internship.

Nine weeks later, the law firm will offer you a job.

STEP TEN: One smart thing to do after you get a job is to set about alienating every person you've ever been close to. This is a little harder than it sounds, but now that you're gainfully employed, law school isn't exactly taxing; you should have plenty of time to focus. One way to start is to hardly pay attention when your best friend starts dating someone who will eventually become his fianceé. If you're dating someone yourself, now is a good time to start disregarding his/her feelings and doing whatever you please all day long. By all means: ramp up the drinking. And it's not a bad idea to remind everyone you know that you'll soon make more money in one year than all of their lowly ancestors' lifetime earnings put together. It's pretty fun once you get into it.

STEP ELEVEN: By now, you're so close to being a blowhard corporate lawyer you can taste it. All you've got to do is pass the Bar. Unfortunately, the Bar presents an interesting challenge to a slacker like yourself: try as you might, there's pretty much no way to pass this thing without actually studying for it all summer. So if you want to bumble your way through this, you're going to have to be creative. Here are a few quick and easy tips:

(a) When your law school's records department says they mailed all your relevant information to the NY Bar Association, it's a good idea to believe them and not-- under any circumstances-- check with the Bar to make sure they received everything.

(b) Start a blog.

(c) When you run into a classmate sitting by himself at the bar at your local Outback steakhouse and you tell him nervously that you haven't booked a hotel in Albany yet and he laughs and says you're probably already fucked but he'll make some calls on your behalf RIGHT NOW, RIGHT FUCKIN NOW AT THE BAR AT OUTBACK STEAKHOUSE while you sit down and eat your stupid vegetarian pasta primavera alfredo bullshit, it's not a bad idea to believe him. Go ahead and nurture this incredibly insane delusion until a week before the Bar, without ever once bothering to ask him if he actually booked you a room or if he was just blowing smoke.

(d) When it's exactly one week before the Bar and you all of a sudden realize in a panic that you haven't received a seating assignment for the exam because the Bar never got your law school information, and finally come around to the idea that your drunken acquaintance at Outback probably didn't actually book you a hotel room because it occurs to you he doesn't even know your last name, and then also try booting up your computer to search for a last-minute hotel and find your computer is deader than a god damned doornail and all of a sudden it hits you flush that you can't access your notes and outlines for the Bar exam and hell apparently you're not even signed up for the fucking Bar anyway and even if you were you still don't have a place to stay; when this happens and you can honestly say you've treated the most important test of your entire life with the same crippling-fear-disguised-as-nonchalance that's confounded everyone you ever used to be close to since that time in kindergarten when your teacher had to tell your parents to stop letting you do your homework in fucking crayon, and when you look this realization square in the eye (so to speak) and tell it honestly "yes, this is the way i've chosen to live my life", now's when you know you're ready to pick up and move to a huge city 400 miles away from anyone who ever loved you and start working a 70 hour a week job that you can make a pretty strong case you're ghastlily unqualified for.

By comparison, the Bar exam is a trip to the zoo.

STEP TWELVE: Congratulations. You're a corporate lawyer. Everything you've ever dreamed of is now yours for the taking.

But just in case you wake up alone one morning in your sparsely-appointed efficiency and realize you've never had especially vivid or creative dreams, or if one day you're sitting in an airport playing BrickBreaker on your BlackBerry and decide all at once that putzing your way through college and law school is one thing but faking your way through the next 50 years is a whole other kettle of fish, just in case this ever happens to you, probably the best thing to do right then is to close your eyes and take one deep breath.

After that, you're on your own.