The first shall be last

This is the semester that will not die. My original plan was to be done early, while all the rest of the suckers slaved away during the second half of exam week. It happened that all four of my exams were scheduled during the first week, and although I could postpone some, I had no plans to put off the inevitable. After all, my brother was graduating from college on December 12th, after many long years of equivocating over whether to put forth the effort to get the degree. On top of that, one of my 30 things to do before turning 30 was to get out to Denver to visit him. I was planning on boarding a plane on Friday with nothing but a change of clothes and a fifty dollar bill with which to get my brother hammered.

Then my first exam happened on Monday. I was able to fight off the strong urge to go straight to the bar to drink my troubles (i.e. 1500-word limits!) into oblivion. As any survivor of a law school exam will know, that is no small feat. However, the only reason I was able to stay sober was because I had a date to study with a classmate for my evidence exam, a mere 40 hours away. After we were through, thoughts of the "free slot" exam I had planned to take the next day took on a laughable tone. Instead of studying, I hung up Christmas decorations with T and we watched more Deadwood. Post-Evidence exam on Wednesday, I had all but vowed in blood that I'd be postponing ONE exam until the next week. I was still ready to take on Employment Law on Friday.

Then I remembered rush hour traffic. To be more precise, my friend reminded me that the airport we were planning to fly out of on Friday at 7:00 takes an hour and fifteen minutes to get to without traffic. My exam was due to let out at 5:30. It was postpone exam #2 or miss brother's graduation (and lose out on a bunch of money). I made a beeline to the Dean of Academic Affairs.

So. Flashforward one week and here I am about ready to take an exam at 6:00 so I can come home to cram for my final final exam on Thursday (or, horrors!... Friday??). Thus I am fulfilling at least the second half of the biblical prophecy: The last shall be first, and the first shall be last. May I never secretly gloat over finishing my finals before other law students again.