I can't believe that it's been almost four years since I started law school and would like to thank CFers for being so supportive of my late-in-life (now 50, yikes!) career change. The you-can-do-its helped keep me going in moments of doubt that all law students seem to experience.

It's been an amazing experience. I started as a part-time evening student while still working full-time as a municipal reporter, a job that I loved but knew would likely come to an end given changes in the newspaper industry. Fortunately, I had a phenomenal Contracts professor my first semester and knew from that point on that I wanted to continue. I did eventually lose my job when most the newsroom was laid off by seniority, but even that had a silver lining - my editor had given me advance warning so that I wouldn't leave voluntarily.

I've stayed in the evening program, which gave me the opportunity to interesting things - intern for a judge, teach in a failing urban district, work as a teaching assistant to help students improve their writing skills, compete in a moot court competition, work as a Law Review editor, etc. Some of the activities were way out of my comfort zone (me, argue in front of a real judge??), but Christopher Robin seemed to have it right: "You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think." (I'd better put that quote on my wall as a reminder for the future!) I even got good grades - not bad for an old gal ;) I'm currently working for an attorney and interning with a surrogate office.

So I graduate in May, take the Bar(s) in July, and begin a year-long clerkship in August doing criminal and contested wills. After that, I hope to either clerk for a year in the federal courts or go into practice doing trusts & estates/probate litigation/elder law or commercial law. The market for lawyers is extraordinarily bad and realistically, my age will be a factor, but I'm hoping that I'll end up where I'm meant to be - employed ;)

Sue