Sunday, March 7, 2010

TLF


When I got to UT Law I heard pretty quickly about an organization called TLF, or Texas Law Fellowships. My mentor is on TLF and she's one of those people who makes everything sound like a ton of fun, but that wasn't the only reason I decided to join. TLF raises money every year to fund law students working in unpaid public service internships in the summer. This is a really important thing to do because without this money, many of the nonprofit organizations would not be able to host the intern and many interns would not be able to work for the organizations. I joined TLF because I loved the idea of law students raising money largely from other law students in order to help fund, yes, law students. The self-sufficiency of it impressed me. Professors also get in on the action, donating time and money to support our fundraising efforts. It's an incredibly cooperative endeavor and I am so proud to be a part of it.

I also love how every time TLF thinks of spending money on something we remind ourselves that any overhead we have only takes away from a fellowship we can give. TLF is one of those rare fundraising operations that actually gives almost all of its money to the people for whom the money is raised. Now you can probably tell where I'm headed.

Because [insert familiar economic explanation here], this year we have a ton of applicants and not a ton of money to fund. Our Spring pledge drive starts tomorrow and we need money! Check out our website (http://www.utexas.edu/law/orgs/tlf/) and please chip in. When you donate $25 or more you receive 6 votes to choose which students you want to see receive a fellowship. Look on the PayPal site for a link to write in your votes. There is a list on our homepage of the applicants so you can see the awesome nonprofit work UT law students are doing and choose your votes accordingly. By donating you will feel vicarious fulfillment through the students' acts of selflessness.

TLF also has a sweet motto "make love not law review," which makes us sound like a crew of free-loving intellectuals who don't care much for prestigious labels. If that doesn't make you want to give us money I don't know what will.

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

postscript

I just reread the last post and I am afraid I may have overplayed the relative monotony of this semester. Perhaps these points aren't redeeming at all, but I played on a skee-ball team last week (and we kicked ass), I recently perfected my migas recipe, and I am absolutely pumped for my summer job working in capital defense. And I have been listening to an old Modest Mouse album a lot lately, which just somehow makes my life feel more cool and exciting.

1L Spring

Today in Contracts our professor pointed out that we're on class 25 of about 50 this semester. Halfway through. A maddening idea.

This semester has been so different from last, which is a big reason I've been awful at keeping up the blog. Last semester I came to Austin and UT with my eyes wide and my jaw often dropped. I had no idea what to expect and I was ready for the challenge of accustoming my life to this weird city and to the equally but very differently weird experiment of being a first-semester 1L. Though there were pangs of loneliness, I certainly never regretted displacing myself to what was in many ways, a foreign land. The learning curve for a first semester 1L is incredibly steep, and seeing the day to day molding of my mind was fascinating and extremely validating. By the end of the semester I was encapsulated by law school and though it was trying at times, I loved every moment of it. I was high on the challenge of school and the newness of my life in Austin. I was constantly inspired and I tried to reflect that in keeping up this blog.

And now onto this semester. My love for school has not waned, nor has my appreciation for this great city. But the newness has faded and I am settled into my life as a law student more than ever. My life is mostly consumed by school and the various extracurriculars that have seemed to creep up on me. Plus I had the extra weight of finding a summer job. In one word, this semester is more focused.

I could tell the first day of classes that this semester was going to be a different thing. People raised their hands, almost unheard of first semester. Gone were the butterflies fluttering around the stomachs of fall 1L's. It was as if people had been doing push ups over winter break to get their biceps in tip-top hand-raising shape. Depending on grades from last semester people either got it in their minds that they needed to step it up, or they needed to maintain their edge. Either way, the wide-eyed fawns of last semester were replaced by a herd of mature bucks. This can be intellectually enthralling or totally annoying.

Though it's not obvious, I like the focus of this semester. However it has turned me into a bore. I wake up at 6 AM, I am home at 7 PM. I cook a healthy dinner, allow myself some wine, and curl up in bed with a casebook or more recently, with Foucault's Ethics (don't be impressed: I chose Foucault for the guaranteed inducement of sleep). I have taken to lighting candles in my apartment when I am home and I use scented soaps. Sometimes I have a friend over for dinner and I go to Pilates twice a week. I go out once a week and on weekends usually spend the days at the library.

As you can tell there's less excitement, which means less inspiration. However I will wrap up with this conversation I had at Urban Outfitters tonight. Even though my life this winter in Austin has admittedly been a bit vanilla, the city never fails to throw you some humor.

(I was wearing a t-shirt that said "Make Love not Law Review.")

Sales guy: Are you a law student?
Me: Yup.
Sales guy: What kind of law do you do?
Me: Not sure yet but I think criminal law.
Sales guy: Nice, I can help you out with that. (I think he meant he can help me get clients.)