Note: This serial is fictional.
Fenno skipped out of class, his step light. He had finished his 1L classes. The past year was suddenly a blur: it had humbled him, challenged him, shouted him down, shook him to his very core, revealed to him the horrible inconsistencies of the law… And yet it was over.
Not quite over: there were three more grueling and tedious weeks ahead. Three weeks later, he would feel an even greater sense of accomplishment wash over him, after he had completed his last final. He would run wild with his section the last real night of his 1L year, feeling finally like he belonged with his imperfect section mates, each strange and impossible to discern, just like him.
There were so many uncertainties still in Fenno’s future: Would EIP bear fruit for him? What would he do after graduation? Where would he end up living?
Yet those questions could wait. In fact, Fenno began to take comfort in their mystery. The fact that so much of his future was yet undetermined wrapped Fenno in the knowledge that he was still growing, still changing, still open to revision and improvement. His uncertainty was no longer an ailment to be cured, but a badge that he would carry with him for the rest of his life, as he continued to learn and adapt and appreciate all those unanswered questions and discovered new unanswerable ones.
But, today, he had finished his 1L classes. And that little victory was something to revel in.
“Fenno” is a fictional serial written by an anonymous law student. The main character is always named Fenno and is always a 1L, but his or her character changes every school year. This installation is part of the series for the 2011 to 2012 School Year entitled “The Uncertain Fenno, 2011 to 2012.”