Why people take bar trips

So, there is this practice among law graduates of taking a bar trip, which is (pretty self-evidently) going on vacation somewhere immediately after taking the bar. I personally have a sort of problem with this concept, probably mostly because I'm kind of jealous of people going to cool places like Spain or Italy. But partly, I'm a little turned off the whole thing because it makes me think of the kind of spring break trips you take when you're in college (which I didn't really do when IN college, and definitely don't do now, although yes, I have classmates who went on spring break trips in law school). It honestly seems a little privileged, and outside my non-traditional experience of law school.* (No, I did not make the best friends of my life in law school, because law school just does not occupy that place in your life when you're 42. No, I did not go on trips over spring break. No, I'm not taking a bar trip.)

But now I have come to understand the wisdom of getting the hell out of Dodge and heading somewhere completely different right after the exam, because it would be a really effective way to really leave the exam behind you. Last night I dreamed that I had to come up with legal rules, and I'm exhausted but I can't turn my brain off or concentrate on anything fun, because I keep thinking I should be studying, and doing things like try to review the specific intent crimes in my head. I doubt I'd be doing that if I were in Rome or Jamaica right now.

*I really really don't mean this as a criticism of any individual who actually is taking a bar trip. Seriously, i hope everyone I know who's taking one has an awesome time, because you totally deserve it. Actually, I think what's really going on here is the fact that when you're a professor 1) the times when students get to travel on breaks are always times when you aspire to get a ton of work done, and 2) your "fun" travel is to conferences and archives, has left me a warped, bitter, resentful husk of a woman with regard to vacations. So please ignore my bile.

Comments

[What Now?]

Congrats on finishing the exam! And yes, I'm sure it's almost impossible to turn off your brain after two arduous days of testing, not to mention the arduous months/years before that.

Is there a way for you to get out of Dodge for a couple of days, even if it's not to someplace exotic but just to some place down the road a ways? You certainly deserve some reward!

[joy]

I have really mixed feelings about bar trips. On the one hand, dear god YES I WANT TO TAKE ONE NEXT SUMMER. On the other hand, the privilege of it all is off-putting. There is also the fact that if I planned to work at a firm, it would still be an expression of privilege, but one more in keeping with my projected salary, but I'm not planning on working at a firm, so....is that really the best way to spend money? That said, my husband and I have always spent money on travel, and one of the things that I miss most about having moved back to the U.S. for law school is that I don't travel nearly as much. A bar trip would in a certain sense revive my pre-law-school lifestyle and identity.