Anxiety--reminding myself why law school, part 3

The other night I had my first anxiety dream about law school. It was such a textbook classic that it just made me laugh. In the dream, I moved into my house but it was right across the street from the school. It was the first day of classes but I'd forgotten about it, I couldn't find my class schedule, and I hadn't done my reading. In my dream, we had white coats to wear like they do in medical school. I put on my coat and immediately got dirt on it, which I could not get off. Thank god I'm not really going to medical school, there's no way I could keep one of those coats clean for more than ten minutes.

But I've been reading Law School Confidential, just to make sure I have some kind of grip on what's in front of me. And it's freaking me out, because it seems like such a long hard slog, and it seems too easy get on the wrong track and stay on that slog for the rest of your lawyerly life.

Plus, within a couple of months I'll have paid off my credit cards and gotten the IRS off my back, and my salary at my current job will start seeming a lot bigger--and here I go quitting and taking out a student loan.

Still, I think I'm going to be good at this. I'm verbal and analytical and naturally kind of a wonk. If you've been reading this blog, you might have doubts about my ability to write in a way that's clear, concise and to the point, but I have done it often in my work life.

I've talked generally about why law school, but I do have some specific ideas about the kind of work I might like to do. I'd do a judicial clerkship if I could get one, then possibly work for an environmental public interest firm. I could also see myself working for the Louisiana DEQ or the EPA, except those agencies seem so badly compromised, particularly the DEQ. I don't necessarily have to specialize in environmental law, either. I have to allow my experience in school to help me figure out what most suits me. I could see myself working as a US Attorney, maybe. But in the end I'd like to end up a law professor who also does some outside work, or directs a clinic. There are at least two professors at school who have careers I admire and would like to use as a model. It's just going to be very, very important to stay focused on where I want to go with this and avoid getting sidetracked by the gravitational pull of what everyone else is doing.