All Grown Up

Today one of my good friends from high school visited me. Even though we goofed around while shopping at the mall and around my apartment, it's strange to think that we're adults. I almost wanted to put quotes around the word adults but we are legally and in actuality too.

Maybe I don't feel it as much because I'm still in school, albeit law school, but it's strange to have friends in real jobs. My friend visiting tests fighter jets, how cool is that? I also helped her look at wedding things since she's engaged.

As we took a stroll down memory lane and did the "what's he/she up to" game, we filled each other in on what our high school classmates were up to. Whether they're getting married, becoming doctors, testing fighter planes, working for non-profits, investment banking, becoming a weatherman, teaching kids, parenting children (ok, that's the scariest one), or whatever else they're up to, it's all very interesting. While a lot of my high school friends have asked if I'm going to put together our 5 or 10 year high school reunion, it's not something I really feel like doing at least now. But it would be interesting to see what everyone is like now.

Religious Hiders and Seekers

The other night I was reading about the baby boomers and religion in Newsweek. It talked about how pop culture and other current events shaped different religious and spiritual movements during our parent's generation. "So in addition to everything else the baby boomers were known for--poltical activism, sexual freedom, yuppie careerism and a taste for expensive imported cheese," they have also been deemed as the generation of "religious seekers," (Newsweek). Instead of looking for salvation in the afterlife, these religious and spiritual movements taught instant and right now salvation. Funny how that is the common thread between movements that seem so different, like the John Lennon popularized-Indian based "transcendential meditation," the Church of Scientology, and born-again "Jesus Freaks." While Newsweek admits that the religious movements that they wrote about were a minority, they were nonetheless a face or an image of the times.

So it made me think about what an article about religion and my generation would say. I feel like my generation has an overwhelmingly negative view on religion. I don't know if it's because I lived far away from the "bible belt" in California, but Facebook's "religious views" seem to indicate to me that a lot of my friends across the country are proudly athiest and/or have denounced whatever religion their parents brought them up in. Don't get me wrong, I don't look down on people who aren't religious at all. [Though as a random aside, I wish I could be treated with the same respect back. I don't tell you that you're going to Hell (mainly because I don't think that), so why do you openly bash on all Christians/religious folks in front of me?]

I'm Catholic. I go to church every week. And most of the time, I feel like I'm one of the very few young people like this. At UCLA, I only had one other friend like this (hi Lauren!) and when I go to church now, I feel like I'm the only person in the 18-30 range (well, maybe because I go at 9AM). And it really makes me wonder 1) is there a huge religious die-off or is my perception warped by the demographic I'm around, and 2) if so, what caused it?

I go under the assumption that there has been a decrease on religiosity, so why? My very unresearched hypothesis is that it has to do with politics (because really, I can link everything to politics). I think my generation has seen the Religious Right obtain dispropartionate power and try to legislate their religious beliefs through trying trying to ban abortion, ban same-sex marriage, teach creationism in school, put prayer in public schools, and more. And this really scares a lot of young people away. I just really want to yell, "Hey, it scares me too but not all religious people are like that, trust me!"

And while I may be speaking from a California-liberal point of view, I feel like the concerns about what the Religious Right are trying to do does indeed span across both sides of the aisle. While the Democratic party may have a lot of splits on a lot of things, most young dems I know are fiercly united on trying to preserve the sepearation of church and state. On the conservative end, the majority of my friends are economically conservative and socially moderate/liberal. They may agree with the Republican party's philosophy of small government, big defense, and laissez-faire economics, but tend to ignore/look past/disagree/be embarassed by their party's religon-fueled social policies. Not all my Republican friends, but most of them.

This again, is just a hypothesis. Some other theories include bad Sunday School experiences, church scandals, archaeic/male dominated church hierarchies, individual over group based activities because of technology, or all of the above. Nonetheless, it seems like people my age are hiding from religion or hiding the fact that they are religious because it has such a negative connotation. People no longer view religion as a personal belief system but rather as a force pushing a lot of policies that are less popular to the Millenial generation.

Think Like A Lawyer

They say that going to law school changes your way about thinking about the world. Upon finishing my 4th week here, I can safeuly say it's true on many different levels. Here are my guesses of the most frequent thoughts running through the average law student's mind. I could be totally wrong, but if anything, you'll see what goes through my head daily since I've started here. Honestly, I don't know what I thought about before law school but I'm pretty sure it wasn't this:

-Man, if only I studied this hard in undergrad.
-All this debt will be worth it one day.
-I couldn't totally sue for that.
-Mike Shecket is my hero. (just google any case and you'll see)
-Why is everyone around me married?
-Why don't we get an equivalent to a White Coat ceremony like our med school counterparts?
-People really need to stop suing each other.
-Those people with rolly bags are so smart but I'd never get one because I'd rather look cool.
-"That guy" really needs to shut up and stop asking questions.
-Law & Order is so factually wrong (but I still love it).
-Is it time for bar review yet?
-How could so few pages of reading take so long?
-Please don't call on me, I have no idea what your question means.
-I spend more time with my books than with any human being.
-I'm pretty sure I'm reading another language.
-And occassionally...This is really cool.

Politically Sidelined

It is easy to compare politics to football. It is big in the fall, there is a lot of competition, there are different teams with different colors, there are challenges on calls, there is a lot of strategizing, and only one person can win the big game. So I guess then it is not surprising when I say I feel like I'm watching everything from the sideline instead of being out there on the field.

I decided a while ago that I was going to take a political sabbatical to focus on my academics and not burnout from politics. There are some times when I really miss it. I feel like that injured player who just wishes to be back in the game and feels like she's missing out on all the action. Yesterday, with the primary elections in DC and Maryland, was one of those moments. As I was checking the results of these races that I'm not very familiar with (I have only been a local for precisely a month), I saw that Jamie Raskin, an American University professor, had beat out a 20+ year incumbent for the Democratic nomination for a State Senate district. I know that the Law School Dems poured their heart and souls into that race, so it must have been a really great feeling for them to contribute so much into what seemed like an impossible task. It is a bit selfish for me to have wished to be part of that but I'm overall glad that grassroots campaigns can really help the Davids beat out the Goliaths.

But with every longing to be back in the game, there are also reminders of why I'm glad I took myself out. At the same time when DC candidates are jockeying votes, some ambitious 1L students are running for Senate seats for our law school's Student Senate. Basically with 8 people running in our 90 person section, it feels a little like the recall with just a long list of very interesting characters running in an election that we really don't understand. No one knows what the issues are, people are lobbying for votes using humor and their celebrity, and candidates are challenging other candidates to town halls that no one will go to. Really, it feels like a circus. And I'm not saying I'm above any of this kind of vote getting (as now President Marwa pointed out, we handed out tacos on bruinwalk!) I compeltely understand and sympathize with all of these hoops you have to jump through to get to the job where you can hopefully do some good. But it's nice every once in a while to be above the fray.

While it is ironic that I decided to move to DC and then take my political break, and while I do miss it at times, I'm overall very happy with my position. I would be very sad if I had political meetings interrupt one of the highlights of my week: Project Runway.

Old and New Normals

In the past two days, I've had multiple professors say, "I bet you can't even remember what it was like not to be in law school." And how right they are. Even though this is only my fourth week of law school, it feels like I've been doing the hours upon hours of reading a day and attending these classes for much longer. Likewise, I feel like I've been in a long distance relationship for a long time as well. I guess I would say that law school studying and long distance relationships have become the new normal in my life.

So it was nice to break out of the bubble of my new normal, for at least a weekend. Putting my books aside, I hopped on a plane on Friday morning to visit Alex in Syracuse. I can't even describe how great it was to see him after almost two months. While we talk daily, it was just so much better to hang out with him for the weekend. We toured Syracuse's beautiful campus, got me a bright orange Syracuse tshirt, went to the heartbreaking but very exciting football game, hung out in downtown, watched a lot more football, and ate at "Syracuse's best".

The whole experience was surreal, but of course in a good way. It felt like we had never been apart and we were doing the same old things that we used to do. It was like were were taking the old normal and just moving it to a new place. His RA dorm room has been replaced by a much bigger ARD apartment, we got decked out in orange instead of blue, and hung at a an irish pub instead of Brew Co. I can't wait until he comes to DC (which may be in as few as 2-3 weeks!) so we get to hang out again in yet another new city.

An Eye Opening 5 years

It took me a while to figure out what I was going to write about today; should I write about my trip to Syracuse or should I write about the obvious thing to write about today, 9/11? I decided to hold off my Syracuse entry until tomorrow. It's a Monday and the dreary weather put my in a funk that wouldn't do justice to describing my wonderful weekend in NY. Thus, I will write about this infamous day in history. This is not out of obligation or because everyone else is doing it, but because it actually was a significant day in my own life that I've reflected upon today.

Like I said before, it's been a dreary day in DC. The solemn weather feels only appropriate for one of the main cities completely changed by 9/11. I visited Washington, DC precisely 2 months after the attacks and I was surprised to see all of the new security precautions. Today, almost all of those precautions have become the new norm. Likewise, a lot of things have become new norms for Americans. Whether it is x-raying our shoes at the airport or seeing an orange alert on the news, new concepts have become, like them or not, part of our everyday lives.

And for me, 9/11 marked a new norm in my life: awareness. The attacks came around the same time that I started reading the news and following politics more habitually. I just realized that within these past 5 years, I have transitioned from high school, to college, to law school. And each of these stages of my life provides me with a lot of new perspectives and greater conscientiousness of the realities of the world. It almost feels overwhelming to think about all of the problems and tragedies I started to wonder about or question in the past few years. There were big events like 9/11 (and in my opinion, subsequent problems with the handling of the situation like the erosion of civil liberties), Katrina, the Iraq War, the Tsunami. There were the day to day things like the declining state of schools, poverty, AIDs epidemics, and the number of people without adequate medical care.

All in all though, this awareness has been a mixed blessing that seems to come with adulthood and responsibility. While seeing people suffer is just painstaking, awareness has also made me see and appreciate the willpower of people and the heroism of everyday individuals. The past 5 years have been eye-opening and I expect the next 5 to be deciding what problems to tackle and putting my law degree into action.