Question for all the skating lawyers out there...

[Fouette81]

So I woke up this morning and came to the sad realization that today is my last day as a law student. Sadly it is time to study for the bar, find a job and take part in the "grown up world."

Most people would probably be excited about this. However, I started hypervenilating and having major panic attacks about "How on earth am I going to find time to skate!"

I have seen several posts from other skaters who practice law and I am just wondering if you have any advice on how you fit it all in.

I only started skating for "something fun to do." Like most others here, I became completely addicted and now spend all my free time skating.

Is it really possible to keep it up?

[AnnM]

Well, my first 18 mos. post-bar, I was living in a place that had several skating rinks nearby, including one that was pretty much on the way in to work. I skated about 3-4 times per week during that time, pretty much by finding whatever ice time fit into my schedule. I ended up skating two morning sessions and two evening session per week.

After I changed jobs and moved, my skating has been cut down to 1-2 times per week. This is due to the fact that there is only one ice rink nearby, it's in the opposite direction of the office and the session times clash with my schedule.

I should add that I never worked at a BIGlaw type of firm, so if you have those types of hours in your future, it may be more difficult. Also, when I'm in trial, I usually don't skate very much because I am completely physically and mentally wiped out by the end of a trial day.

Good luck on your exams! Some of the best studying I did for the bar was actually at the ice rink. :D

[RachelSk8er]

There are plenty of working professionals (not just lawyers--doctors, business people, etc with hectic schedules) who are able to keep it up. Are there any rinks close to your home or work with early morning ice time? Or you might have to give up sleeping in on Saturdays if your rink has ice time available.

We're lucky, we have a decent number of home schooled kids at my rink and figure skating ice all day starting at 6 am, but the guy who runs the rink is there by 5:30 every day and will let you on then, and the ice is pay-as-you-go per hour so no contracts and therefore no $ lost if you can't make it. Between that and weekend ice (Sat mornings and Sun early evening), that's when most of our adults skate.

I'm going the work full time/law school in the evenings route, so I'm pretty much limited to an hour 2 mornings/week and 2-3 hrs on Saturdays, but I REFUSE to give up skating, I need it more than ever to get through the next few years.

Even if you can only squeeze in an hour a week, pick a regular time and stick to it. You'll need it to help maintain your sanity :)

[Morgail]

Don't work at a ginormous firm that sucks out your soul by making you work 80 hours a week. Or be a public defender - they work incredibly long hours too. Maybe that's exaggerating, but you can decide what kind of job you want to have. Student loans can be deferred:) I chose a small firm where I hardly ever work more than 40 hours a week (though that may change when it gets closer to my first trial 8O ). I don't make much money, but I get to have a life:D

I miss the daytime public sessions I skated on while I was in law school, but that's a given with any full-time job. I've been able to skate on the early morning sessions (5:50 am) and the few evening sessions available. There aren't a lot of sessions to choose from, so I go to almost all the ones I can get to. I also skate on both Saturday and Sunday on the afternoon public sessions. I'm sure my husband would like it if I came home right after work every day, and my friends would like it if I were actually free during the weekend, but if I want to skate seriously, I have to make it priority. You can make it work if you want to.

[skaternum]

I'm not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV, but I want to chime in and say that there's nothing inherently special about the legal profession that makes it more difficult to skate than any other profession. Most adult skaters have to squeeze in our skatiing around hectic job and family schedules. I currently work with managed global data networks, and if I let it, my job would eat up 60-80 hour weeks. But I've learned to put boundaries on how much time I'll spend on work, and I've learned to skate early in the morning before work.

I'll toss out one more tidbit of advice. No matter what happens, you're going to spend almost 10 times more hours on your job each week than you will on your skating. So choose your job carefully! Make sure that you & it are a good all around "fit," and that it's something you want to do, as much as possible. Especially since it's your first job in this career path, you need to be careful about what you chose to do.

[Fouette81]

Morgail...you have just assured me that it is actually possible. And yes the loans can be put off for a while - now if only my coaches let me deferr my payments for lessons.

I think that perhaps I have just gotten too used to having free time and all I ever hear about are those soul sucking jobs, which I always thought I wanted when I started school. Interesting how priorities change. I like my life outside of school and I'm not ready to give it up. But it is very reassuring that other people are out there doing it.

And I didn't mean to offend anyone with limiting the request to the legal profession. I know that all adult skaters juggle a million things (jobs, families, pets and everything in between), sometimes in order to just get an hour of ice time. I just thought that other skaters would have some insight on whether they had these same fears when graduation was upon them.

Thanks for the replies everyone - I feel much better now. :D

[AnnM]

I think that perhaps I have just gotten too used to having free time and all I ever hear about are those soul sucking jobs, which I always thought I wanted when I started school. Interesting how priorities change. I like my life outside of school and I'm not ready to give it up. But it is very reassuring that other people are out there doing it.



You'll have to think outside of the box a bit, but there are lots of jobs for lawyers that won't suck the soul out of you. Searching openings within local, state and federal govt. is a good way to start. They may not have the perceived glamour and paycheck of BIGlaw, but they will let you have time to enjoy life.

[herniated]

I'm not a lawyer..but I'm not offended either. I knew what you meant. For me I was nervous on how was I going to work skating in after I had a kid. Selfish of me? Isn't it?:) Actually it's not selfish but trying to take care of myself.

You see at the time my husband worked crazzzzyyyy long hours soooo the only time I had was from 5:45am to 6:45am on the ice. Then I HAD to be home. There was noone else to take care of the kid and my job at the time didn't pay enough to afford childcare. So, I really needed some kind of escape. I wanted to skate more than sleep a bit later. And, again I'm not an attorney but being home with a baby is not a 9 to 5 job. It's a 24 hour job, especially when there is limited help. Of course I did not skate 5 to 6 days a week anymore. I skated about 3 morning a week which I still do - 9 years later!! I still make progress just a bit more slowly.

You can make it work!!

[Skate@Delaware]

I got a dose of that sort of reality last week, registering for fall classes...I'm trying to get off of the waiting list and into the Nursing program; seems the class I need is on the night my coach teaches me :evil: and I can't take it at the other campus (yeah more convenient for me mileage-wise AND it's a different night).

I know when I start classes full-time I will have to back off a lot cause i won't be working, but I almost had a panic attack over the thought of not skating...as it is, I can't skate over the summer because of gas prices and I have to save for college (long story, hubby won't pay I don't want to talk about it :evil::evil::evil::evil::evil::evil::evil:)

You can make it work, you just might have to nip it in a bit and make it quality not quantity. There are ways if you are willing!!

[sk8lady]

To quote Bob the Builder (whom I was forced to watch when my son was little and now have permanently stuck in my head), "Can you do it? Yes you can!" It's not easy, though. I had a full-time job as a prosecutor when I started skating and once I started private lessons, I arranged with the other lawyers to take an extra half hour for lunch once a week to allow time for this. One day my boss walked in, noticed I was taking a long lunch, and waited till I got back so he could chew me out for half an hour. No matter that his deputy approved the extra time since I was coming in early and staying late, I got chewed out anyway and told I couldn't skate during work days any more (which meant never, since we didn't have weekend ice at the time.) I decided to quit right about then and within about six months I had quit and started my own practice, since the firms I interviewed with were not interested in offering flexible schedules. I have a home office and I practice law part time and coach part time. My husband also works and I have to say that I could not support myself on what I make right now--but that is more because I also do all the mom stuff and we don't utilize afterschool care--this includes cleaning the house, doing the finances, driving my son around to endless activities including hockey, and, until this year, volunteering at his school--I could easily fit in more hours and schedule them around practice ice, and I often work at night or on weekends, although since there is only one morning a week my coach will give me lessons that's sometimes harder to schedule--I had to add a back-up coach this year.

Luckily the judges are pretty understanding and the other lawyers I work with are either understanding or afraid of me, I'm not sure which. No one seemed to have a problem the time I moved to continue a case because I had a test session the same day, and they all wanted to know how I did at the next court date!

Best of luck to you.

[patatty]

It's definitely manageable, as long as the rink is close to the office. I worked at one of those crazy big law firms right out of school, but I didn't skate then. However, I could have, since nobody seemed to show up until about 9:30 or 10am, and then worked long into the evening. So morning freestyles could have fit in perfectly. Now I'm balancing working part-time (but doing a full time job) and having 2 little kids, and it's still manageable. In general, working as an attorney at least in private practice gives you some flexibility to sneak out every once in a while for something (like skating). If the rink is near the office, you could even do lunchtime sessions. As long as you bill the required hours and aren't gone for half the day, people don't seem to notice.

[kateskate]

I'm in the UK so it may be a bit different but I skate in the mornings before work and at weekends. I do skate one evening a week but am resigned to the fact that I am often late for the session. It is possible to do both. I just told everyone at work when I skate and generally it is fine and I can work round it (ie come in earlier if I skate in the evening or stay later if I skate in the morning) and so far I have only ever had to miss a session once. Not bad I think.

Good luck!

[looplover]

I was going to say what Patatty said - I'm not a lawyer, but I worked as support staff in various biglaw firms while in grad school. I think you could fit in skating before work. Any other time would be tough, but a 7 a.m. freestyle seems doable, or earlier. The partners showed up closer to 10 and the associates closer to 9 a.m. - people generally stayed late rather than get there at the crack of dawn. Good luck!

[Rusty Blades]

I, also, am not a lawyer but a professional in the engineering field and I believe the demands can be similar.

Bitter pill time: you may well have a decision to make - which is most important to you, skating or your career?

The time to build your career is NOW, when you are young and fresh out of school. Let's face it - at the beginning you are just like the thousands of other graduates and THIS is the time to set yourself apart by your track record in practice because what you build today you will have for the rest of your life.

Once you are established and have a professional reputation, THEN you have the clout to "write your own terms".

Sorry to be a wet blanket but there WILL be trade-offs between career and skating. The good news is that it is your decision to make.

[RachelSk8er]

I agree with the "avoid big firms" advice. I'm in the legal department for a large corporation and the most I ever see one of our attorneys work is 45 hrs/week (sometimes as a paralegal I'm putting in longer hours...but that's mostly by choice, I get overtime and the extra $$ is nice so when it's there I take it), friends of mine at small firms work about the same amount of hours and even have some flexibility in their schedules. Yeah it would be nice to have a large firm salary, but when are you supposed to have the time to enjoy it and do the things you like when you work 70 hours a week? (Another advantage for working for a corporation--at least where I'm at, we don't worry about billing time unless its' a certain project, and there are other opportunities within the company if you decide to pursue something else. We have plenty of people with law degrees working in other departments or positions within the company.)

It's important to build a career, but you need to do things for yourself, too, particularly while you're still young enough to enjoy doing them. Overall, that will make you happier and more successful in the long run.

[Kim to the Max]

It's important to build a career, but you need to do things for yourself, too, particularly while you're still young enough to enjoy doing them. Overall, that will make you happier and more successful in the long run.

I agree with RachelSk8er....I am not a lawyer, but I work in a field/position where working 24/7 is almost expected...there is something "wrong" if you leave at 5 when the work day is done and if you do not respond to e-mails at 11pm at night...doing that shows that you are going "above and beyond..." But, my field also has a high level of burn out and people tend to not only look to move up, but to move to other fields with their transferable skills.

I love what I do, but I have found this year (and my supervisor has commented), that I am so much happier now that I have been skating again. One of the things I always tell my student staff is that if you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of others....now, we just need to take that advice ourselves...I am glad that I am doing something for myself because if I didn't, I would be very unhappy and bitter with my job...

[patatty]

I'm going to say the opposite of what many posters have said. I think that if private practice is what you are looking for, definitely go for the big firm now, because you will never go to one later. The experience I received at the big firm couldn't be duplicated anywhere else. There was a level of professionalism and perfection demanded there (and could be demanded given what the clients were paying) that has stayed with me to this day, even though I left that firm 12 years ago. I feel that I am a much better lawyer because of it. I am at a small firm now, and I definitely see a difference in attitudes and work product between those of us who put in time at the big places and those who didn't. I still have many contacts and have received many referrals from my colleagues at the big firm, and while it was brutal being there for 2 years, there were a lot of good times too. Like I said above, there is definitely time to skate if you plan it out.