Impatience

I've been feeling a little impatient lately.  I could say (with just a hint of understated self-awareness) that I'm not really GOOD with uncertainty.

Reminds me of when I was waiting for the results of the Bar Exam.  I took the July exam in California and then moved to Philadelphia for a year (clerkship).  The Bar results would be mailed out Thanksgiving week.  They were timed to arrive on the Friday after Thanksgiving.

I was REALLY GOOD with putting the exam out of my mind after I took it.  (To tell you the truth, I was surprisingly good with putting it out of my mind while I was taking it.  It's a three day exam and I managed to get a good night's sleep each night.)  And for August, September, and October, I didn't give it much thought.  I mean, I'd either passed or I hadn't -- freaking out about it wasn't going to change the result.  So I just went on with my life.

But once it got to be November, I started getting itchy for the results.  And as we approached Thanksgiving, my metaphorical itchiness was the equivalent of hands full of sandfly bites.

I went to Washington D.C. to have Thanksgiving with some relatives who live there.  Of course, nearly all of them asked me, "Did you pass?"  And I was all, "I don't know."  Drove me batty.  I could barely eat the turkey.

And then ... Friday.  I was taking a train back to Philadelphia.  Where I knew my Bar results were waiting in an envelope in my mailbox.  There was no other way to find out.  (Results would be available by phone after the weekend -- the idea being that the people who took the exam should be able to find out their results before anyone else could look them up.  Because, really, if you didn't pass, you'd like to find out in the privacy of your own home -- not having one of your friends call up with, "I've got bad news for you.")  It drove me beyond nuts to know that my results were there and I didn't have them.

A friend offered to drive me to the train station.  I splurged for the Metroliner -- that would be the faster train.  Because I was just about at the breaking point here and I needed those results right quick.  So, here's my friend driving me to the train station and getting lost.  We can see the station from where we are, but we can't get there.  And my train is leaving in, like, five minutes.

My friend is being all joking and calming and says, "Well, if you miss it, you can sleep over and take the train tomorrow," and I say, in dead seriousness, "If we miss the train, you're getting back on the highway and driving me to Philadelphia."  (Well, I believe the sentence was spiced up with a few expletives, but that's the idea.)

We somehow made the train and I got to Philly.  Took a cab to my apartment and ran for the mail room.  Opened the mailbox to find a big envelope from the State Bar.

The people from the State Bar are REALLY smart.  They send the big envelope, but on the front of it is a little pouch with a single page letter -- and the envelope says in Big Important Type that you're supposed to open the single page letter first.  So I did.  And it began with "Congratulations."

And all of that freaking out that had me nearly ripping my friend's head off dissipated -- leaving me drained, and (above all) relieved. 

The first person I told was the doorman.