10 Signs You’re Living with a Law Student

1. He or she spends all his/her time with a friend named “Carol.”

Girlfriends and wives of law students have to get used to the fact that “Carol” is actually a desk, a carrel. (“What do you mean, ‘your Carol’?!”)

2. You can’t watch movies or TV shows that have to do with court or lawsuits because everything that’s wrong will be pointed out.

But seriously. It’s one thing when we are watching Law & Order or Criminal Minds, but I don’t care how accurate Legally Blonde is. (And who says that Elle Woods couldn’t get a 179 on the LSAT, anyway?)

SSUCv3H4sIAAAAAAAEAJ2QSw7CMAxE90jcocq6i0BBfK5SsTCpVSxCgxIXhFDvTj6t5DW7zLPH8fi7XlWVukIgo87VN6moydoxsAcmN0Ss65ljR+w8gU0wsSlXVGDgMWBII2ZkgLGPvQXO/uWftuhqKeRidMSSUrVgYbxmtqCp/ttZHpclCvQ4mE9eWATxaBFKkLa0qvub0T9ktBd16ISGsSMnUr6cAZsMjZj89GRo6IXN8Q29vFg8uXsIMDjOm8zBVBdPmuSm2eitPh52O31q9Gm/1zHl9AMC1XxDygEAAA==

3. When you argue and say, “You do this all the time,” he or she asks, “Are you sure I do it all of the time?”

They have been trained to not make blanket statements because blanket statements are so easy to disprove. “‘No case has ever said that’? Here is one.” So when you are arguing and you say, “You never turn the light off,” the merciless, legal part of their brain takes over, just out of reflex.

Young woman stares in camera with a perplexed look.

4. You have discovered that there is a case that relates to virtually any conceivable topic of conversation.

“Is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable?” And your spouse says, “Actually, the Supreme Court ruled on this question in Nix v. Hedden.”

United States Supreme Court building in black and white.

5. When you argue, he or she starts using complicated legal terms to describe your offenses.

Don’t even think about changing your argument or you’ll hear the word “estoppel.”

6. An 80-hour per week job doesn’t sound so bad.

It can’t be worse than taking five classes, doing law review edits, doing research for a professor, going to Moot Court competitions, and doing a part-time evening job, right? (Right?!!!)

Exhausted young businessman

 

7. You think of the biggest words you can use in each situation to impress him or her.

Because now you are competing with Justice Scalia, who can write things like “jiggery-pokery,” “argle-bargle,” and “pure applesauce,” and still sound brilliant.

openning book

8. You get tired of him or her reading the terms and conditions for absolutely everything.

Although, if he/she didn’t, then you might never have found out that clause 57.10 of Amazon.com Web Services’ terms and conditions includes a contingency plan “in the event of the occurrence . . . of a widespread viral infection transmitted via bites or contact with bodily fluids that causes human corpses to reanimate and seek to consume living human flesh, blood, brain or nerve tissue and is likely to result in the fall of organized civilization.”Terms and conditions with wooden pen

9. When “living with a law student” means that he or she actually lives at the law school, and just uses your home as a mailing address.

It’s good to have a mailing address, though, because it turns out that he or she can’t have casebooks shipped to a carrel.

10. You always say, “we” when you talk about law school–like, “We are in our third year.”

Because it really is a team effort, and your spouse knows that they wouldn’t be able to go through law school without you.

 


Special thanks to the BYU Law Spouse Association for writing this blog post.

Comments (0)

Leave a Comment