Is a saying that my dad taught me…As a carpenter he’d take on these really big jobs…he learned from somebody that he worked with that you just gotta have steady pressure on it and not panic. I guess that kinda describes my law school journey. It feels like such a massive undertaking for me…that I just have to remember, “steady pressure, don’t panic”.

I’ve been working through the LSAT textbook. It’s a lot harder than I thought it would be but it makes a lot of sense to me why that is. It’s like a filter…if you’re not willing to really work through and prepare for this test than you probably shouldn’t be in law school to begin with.

I really enjoy practicing the problems…boiling things down to their logical constituent pieces…I know that this is generally not a good philosophy to have towards life and people in general…that that kinda thinking can get you in trouble! But all the same, it’s a good skill to have and one that I really value and enjoy.

My plan is to take the test by June. So I have about five and a half months to continue studying.

I’m really enjoying it and will keep the internet posted.

Hello world. My name is Alex Salemme, current resident of Arlington, Virginia. I am 29 years old at the time of this writing. For almost ten years I’ve considered going to law school and have just recently decided that it’s time to turn that vision into a reality.

I distinctly remember as a child of about eight being asked that ubiquitous question: what do you wanna be when you grow up. Having almost no knowledge of anything to do with the profession I said…”I want to be a lawyer”.

Well, here I am now…about to embark on the journey.

But……Why?

What is a lawyer? What is law? And why choose this path?

Well, I couldn’t even tell you any reason why eight year old me said lawyer…

And as for waiting so long after I graduated college in 2013…I guess I just never felt like my motivation for going was right. I didn’t want to go into it just because there was nothing else to do. I didn’t want to go into it without some sort of vision.

Laws fascinate me…because…a law is…non-corporeal…and yet…has so much influence on corporeal things. Law is just…words on a page…but words that carry weight, and meaning.

Laws are basically concerned with human conduct. They regulate, guide, and restrict human conduct.

There’s something about it all…that just fascinates me…for without laws…the world would be…chaotic…disorderly…insecure and unstable. Even in the absence of a rule of law…informal laws would take their place.

Anyways…enough rambling…but those are just some of the ideas and motivations that I have for pursuing a law degree…there’s just something about it all that just fascinates me to no end.

So…let’s get down to brass tacks…

The first tangible step forward towards realizing this journey is to take the LSAT (Law School Admissions Test). From what I know, it basically tests your ability to think logically in a short period of time. You get like twenty minutes for each section of the test and have to basically solve these logic puzzles. Something like that.

Anyways, the first step is taking this test and hopefully getting a good score and sending this along with your college transcripts to the school you want to get into. From what I hear they basically look at two things: your LSAT score and your college GPA.

There’s a bunch of ways to prepare for the test, some are free, some cost a lot of money. Either way you need to commit like six months to getting ready for the test. I’m opting for paying like $1,500 dollars because by committing that kind of money, on a psychological level it’s like, “okay, I’m really committed to this”. That, as opposed to just grinding out the tests by myself which I think I’d have a hard time doing and staying motivated with.

I will keep you all posted on my LSAT journey.