Checking in

I had three exams in a row.  Just finished my third – which I was able to take pass/fail, since you get to select one class in law school to take pass/fail, and I’d saved mine til now!  Thank heavens, too – that sucker was not easy.  I’m fairly confident I passed it, though, which was all that was needed!  “You’re welcome” to the rest of the class for padding the curve!

The first two, which I took for a grade, went swimmingly.  Absent a curve, I’d feel confident I’d gotten As on both, so we’ll see what the curve does to me.  I have one remaining.  I am within inches (two hundredths of a GPA point, to be exact) of graduating summa cum laude, with the highest honors, and this has become something of a Point for me to make, a Point about how Mothers of Young Children Can Gestate Humans, Bear Them in Moments of Excruciating Pain, Feed them From The Own Bodies, Forego Untold Hours of Sleep, Work through Illness, Get Three People Dressed, Fed, and Off in the Morning, and Still Kick Your Condescending Male Non-parental Ass on the Law School Curve.  And even though the non-parental male wins, as he will be paid considerably more than a similar woman would throughout their respective lifetimes, not to mention all those afternoons off for golf – well, having that good old “summa” on my diploma would make me feel like I had SHOWN THEM.  This does not apply to every non-parental (or parental) male in my life, but I am thinking in particular of just a handful from law school, like the guy who snorted when he saw me pregnant in the elevator and said he guessed I didn’t have a job yet (ha ha!  Now I have one and he doesn’t!), and the other guy who said he didn’t know how I did it with kids, and it was obvious that I must be failing, since he’s struggling and he doesn’t even have kids, which I think was supposed to be some sort of compliment maybe?  And the guy who beat me in last year’s election, who told me at a party the other day that he was glad I hadn’t gotten his job, because it was a lot of work and he’s pretty sure I’d have preferred to be with my kids rather than do all this work, and somehow he missed that point??  I guess??  That was made last year??  About how kids don’t automatically make me less qualified or less ready to work or less ANYTHING, really??

And now that you’ve reached your limit on hearing about my exam strategy/schedule/life, I’ll leave you with this:

Liam calls sheep “beep.”  Totally slays me.

Now I’m off to study Marine Insurance.  It’s complicated, but it’s also more interesting than you’d think (the law hasn’t changed since the 1800s, and marine insurance policies still regularly retain this clause, the romanticism of which may explain to you why I love admiralty law):

Touching the Adventures and Perils which the Underwriters are contented to bear and take upon themselves, they are of the Seas, Men-of-War, Fire, Lightning, Earthquake, Enemies, Pirates, Rovers, Assailing Thieves, Jettisons [what are those?], Letters of Mart and Counter-Mart [literally nobody knows what these are supposed to be anymore, but they’re in the clause anyhow!], Surprisals, Takings at Sea, Arrests, Restraints and Detainments of all Kings, Princes and Peoples, of what nation, condition or quality soever, Barratry of the Master and Mariners and of all other like Perils, Losses and Misfortunes that have or shall come to the Hurt, Detriment, or Damage of the Vessel.