A lot of my classmates were happy about my test's cancellation, I was not among them. I studied last night and all morning and when 3 PM came I was ready to get the exam over with. Unfortunately just as I was getting ready to touch my pencil to paper the professor came in and told us that because of the snowstorm the test would be postponed. This made me mad because it means nothing more than an extra 4 days of stressing out. Of course this class cancellation also meant the cancellation of my CLA meeting (something I was not terribly upset about). The mock trial was also cancelled due to snow, which in some ways is a good thing because now I have another opportunity to coach the kids before their round. After all of my obligations for the day were cancelled the question became: how do I use this time?
As a law student we don't get a lot of time. This unexpected windfall of free minutes led most of my classmates to go out for a beer before going home. When asked if I was going out I told them that I should probably get going home. I drove in to school today in anticipation of the mock trial round and felt that I should get home before the roads became to bad to drive on. What a mistake that was.
I spent over an hour on the horrible roads, about 40 minutes of that just waiting to get onto the highway. I can't speak for all highways, but many of the entrance ramps here in Minneapolis have stoplights on them to moderate incoming cars during times of high traffic. This afternoon an accident occurred right at those stop lights. This made it so that no cars (except the carpool lane) could get onto the highway until the accident was cleared up. To occupy my time I called up Brewdog, who goes to school in LA and asked him how it felt to be in a place like that when the sky is falling in his hometown.
As I talked to my old friend I noticed that many of the cars were now hopping the median to get into the car pool lane despite the fact that they only person in the car was the driver. I watched as the number of cars jumping into illegality increased while a few do-gooders at the front of the line continued to play the waiting game with righteous indignation. when weighing whether to join their ranks or not I pondered for a moment the oath I will have to take as a lawyer to never knowingly break the law. After thinking about this I thanked the lord I had not yet been admitted to the bar and started my attempt at the single person car pool. My car being only a sedan it actually took me three attempts to hop the median. Each of the first two times after an unsuccessful first try I timidly pulled back into my lane, telling myself I didn't want to break the law anyway.
Eventually I succeeded in my plan to violate the traffic statutes and for a moment I was very happy. There is a little rush that comes along with thinking you have gotten away with something you know is wrong, I have not felt this very many times in my life as I have always been very fearful of authority but right now I was swimming in these feelings of euphoria. That feeling, however, would proved to be short lived. Immediately after I switched into the carpool lane I saw an undercover police car's lights go off. "No" I thought "this can't be happening... EVERYONE was switching lanes." Thankfully the car passed me and went on to the highway, but the moment of panic renewed my resolve try not to do anything illegal no matter how minor a violation.
The rest of the drive was uneventful but long and slow. I stopped to get a 12 pack of Summit on the way home, ensuring that if I was snowed in at least I had good beer to keep me company. On the whole, I wish I had gone out for a beer with my law school friends. It would have probably made my commute home shorter and I would have gotten to feel back in touch with the people around me. Oh well, next time I just need my friend JLethal to threaten to dropkick me if I don't come out with him.
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