Some Deep Thoughts about My Career

Due to a failure to screen my calls properly, this evening a partner caught me off-guard, and I was forced to chat on the phone with him for more than 30 minutes, and thereby delaying my sleep time tonight by 30 minutes.

It's a firm that I have kind of crossed off my list too. Sigh...

I am beginning to feel very down about the whole job thing. I am all but fairly certain that I would hate working for a firm. Nothing against the people working or planning to work in firms - if they love it, all the more powers to them -- but I am already beginning to sense how soul-crushing those years of "paying your dues" would feel to me, especially coming right out of law school.

But then, to stay in academia is potentially soul-crushing and ego-crushing in another way. Unless you are really sure you have original scholarship to contribute, why would anyone hire you? I have seen first-hand how the system has chewed people up and spit them out (in 3rd tier law schools mostly, or one endless ghetto fellowships after another... is that really a risk worth taking?)

Or I suppose I could go work for a non-profit, but let's face it, I'm the Petite Bourgeoisie here, with an emphasis on the "Bourgeoisie". I need my endless supply of Starbucks lattes and J Crew wool coats. Would I really be happy barely making ends meet knowing I could be making 5X the amount of money? Sometimes I think I could be... but I'm just not sure...

... Government work? Would I be happy working in that huge bureaucracy..? Prosecuting illegal immigrants and felon in possession of firearms...?

People always say "do what you love to do NOW." But don't they know that preferences and desires are amorphous too? It takes me so much energy just to order from a menu for lunch - I'm the most indecisive person in the world. So how the hell am I supposed to figure out what is it that I "love" to do?

Love... is such a relative thing...

My life hitherto has always moved in stages - a few years here, a few years there, never too long in one place, and I have liked it this way. When I think about it, I sort of can't imagine doing law For The Rest Of My Life. The very thought is scary to me. It makes me claustrophobic.

And yet my life seems to be rapidly shaping up for the firms. And I'm becoming very, very afraid.