On Mother’s Day: A Story About My Mother and WWII

Lenore Kunkel Whaley

Both of my parents are dead now, but on Mother’s Day I got to thinking about the following story having much to do with their lifelong romance.

When I was 19 I was surprised one day when my mother told me a story about her marriage to Dad (which occurred on December 13, 1941).  It was a story I’d not heard before, and I marvel at it still.  To the best I can remember it, it goes like this:

In the spring of 1941, my father, Robert Whaley, abandoned his senior year of college at Indiana University to join the Army Air Corp (which became the United States Air Force by the end of World War II).  Like many young men who were joining the services he knew that war was near and that Germany and Japan had to be defeated.  IU, motivated by the same patriotic urge, gave all such seniors their degrees anyway.  Dad was sent to Randolph Air Force Base near San Antonio, Texas, where he received training as a pilot.  In the meantime he was writing letters back to his finance, Lenore Kunkel, with whom he’d fallen in love while they were in high school together in Jasper, Indiana, a small town in the southern part of the state. 

Mom was one of nine children in a very Catholic family, and she’d only been outside of Indiana once in her life when her uncle took her on a business trip to Detroit.  She was in no way sophisticated, and at 23 she was as confused as everyone by the complicated talk of war breaking out.  Dad sent her the money for a train ticket from Indiana to San Antonio so that she could meet him there and get married before he was sent off to his first duty assignment.  In the first week of December, 1941, her father drove her to the train station, she bought the ticket, and with great foreboding, she boarded the train.

The train was packed with military men reporting for duty to various spots and women doing just what she was doing, racing to get married in strange locations.  But for a young woman who was on her own for the first time in her life, she was terrified by the whole experience.  Was this the right thing to do?  Cast off everything she knew and risk her future in a time of war with a new husband who was jumping into the thick of it?  What would she do in Texas, of all places?  What if her beloved Bobby was suddenly sent off to some foreign land—then what would become of her?  A devout Catholic, she did not use birth control, and she might easily be pregnant and soon.

She told all of these fears to a young sailor she met on the train, and he thought her whole story about meeting Dad when she was the head cheerleader and he President of the Class in high school, and their subsequent romance, was great stuff and very romantic.  She agreed with that, but romance wouldn’t solve all the problems and worries that were bedeviling her.  She began to be convinced that this trip was a big mistake, and that she should wait until Dad came back from the war before marrying him.

At Dallas the train stopped and she got off.  She’d decided to get a ticket back to Indiana and return to the safety of her true home.  But the young sailor saw her at the ticket window and asked her what she was doing.  When she told him, he took her by the arm and led her away from the ticket window.  “Look,” he told her, “you’ve forgotten something.” “What?” she asked, defiant.  “You’ve forgotten that at the end of this journey is a man who loves you more than anything in the world, and it will certainly break his heart if you don’t get arrive in San Antonio tonight.”  That made her burst into tears, and, sobbing, she and the sailor reboarded the train.

Things happened fast after that.  Dad met her in San Antonio by sweeping her off her feet in delight on seeing her again after months of being apart, the Japanese invaded Pearl Harbor the next day (which led to a declaration of war), and they were married on December 13^th at the base chapel on Randolph Air Force Base (where, by coincidence, Dad would end his military career 27 years later when he retired from the Air Force).  Below is the only picture of the two of them taken on the day of their marriage, a marriage that lasted until Dad died in Texas in 1980. 

As an Air Force wife, my mother became a world traveler.  She lived all over the globe, routinely moved from place to place without worrying about it, and swore she’d never live in Jasper, Indiana, again.  That proved to be wrong (she died there in 1985), but she lived an incredibly fulfilling life with a wonderful man.  And even late in life she was still grateful to that young sailor.

Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.

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Related Posts:

“My Competitive Parents,” January 20, 2010
"Goodbye to St. Paddy's Day," March 2, 2010
“Bob Whaley, Boy Lawyer,” March 28, 2010
"My Mother's Sense of Humor," April 4, 2010
“The Sayings of Robert Whaley,” May 13, 2010
“Bob Whaley and the Best Evidence Rule,” June 26, 2010
“Bob and Kink Get Married,” June 2, 2010
“Dad and the Cop Killer,” July 19, 2010
“No Pennies In My Pocket,” July 30, 2010
“Doug, Please Get My Clubs From the Trunk,” August 20, 2010

“The Death of Robert Whaley,” September 7, 2010

"My Missing Grandmother," December 26, 2010

"Bob Whaley Trapped in Panama," January 21, 2011

"The Death of My Mother," March 31, 2011
"The Mack Problem: Saving My Parents' Marriage," August 10, 2011

Amusing Pictures of Cats and Other Animals

We’ll start with cat pictures, of course, since I’m living with two cats (Barney and Mama) who play a large part in each of my days.  (Most of these are from the wonderful site: “I Can Has Cheezburger” which you can find at http://icanhas.cheezburger.com/)



Help!
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Click to enlarge]




Now let’s move on to other animals.

 

 

 

 

 

"Because why?"

 

 

 

 

The amazing hand paintings of Guido Daniele:

And finally a photo that’s not amusing at all but stands mightily for the amazing love animals bring into our lives.

 

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Related Posts:
"Parakeets and Me," February 5, 2010
“Bears,” February 23, 2010
"Mama, Biopsies, and My iPad," May 19, 2010
"Milking Cows," June 8, 2010
"Teaching English to Cats," August 6, 2010
"The Purring Heart," November 23, 2010
"The Dogs In My Life," April 18, 2011
“Dog Meat,” December 27, 2009
"My Parents and Dummy," May 13, 2011
"Two Cat Stories: Mama and Barney in the Wild," July 9, 2011
"Zoo Stories," August 30, 2011
“Mama Cat Saves My Life,” October 23, 2011
"Stepping on Cats," February 8, 2012
“Snowbirding, My iPhone 5, and the Coming Crazy Cat Trip,” December 5, 2012
“Barney and the Big Mammal Nightmare,” January 7, 2013 

 

The Words “Queer” and “Gay” in the 21st Century

 

PBS recently presented Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical Carousel in a splendid new concert version “Live From Lincoln Center.”  In the first song two young female millworkers in 1873 are discussing love and one of them sings to the other “You’re a queer one, Julie Jordan— you’re quieter and deeper than a well.”  There’s nothing extraordinary about the use of the word “queer” here since in the context of the song and its time it simply means “strange.”  When I found myself the next day humming the melody I suddenly focused on the word “queer” in the first line and began to speculate on how the word has evolved since the advent of the gay movement, and wondered whether there is much use of the word outside of that context anymore. 

It seems a shame to so completely preempt an age-old meaning, so, in an attempt to rescue the word “queer” and restore it to its more traditional usage, I will sometimes use it as a verb.  For example, in my classroom I can be heard telling my law students, “If a settlement agreement is set to be signed on Friday, never postpone it until Monday if you can avoid it because all too often something will happen over the weekend to queer the deal.”  The students appear startled (they all know I’m gay), and then relax into the idea that “queer” is rightly used in this fashion.  But that’s as a verb.  Employing “queer” as an adjective is still appropriate solely in the limited setting in which it cannot possibly have a homosexual meaning, as in “She heard a queer noise from the basement.”  Only in those limited references does “queer” survives as a word having its original meaning.

“Gay” springs from the French “gai,” meaning “high-spirited,” which in turn was taken from the Old High German “gahi” where it meant ‘impetuous.” It first turned up in print as a reference to homosexuality in a 1933 dictionary of slang, reflecting an oral tradition that had been around at least since the 1920s, apparently originating in the United States and then moving to Great Britain.  In his 1929 operetta “Bitter Sweet” Noel Coward (himself a homosexual) used it in a song in which very fey men sing “As we are the reason for the 90s being gay, we all wear a green carnation” [see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCXwtETzQ9s].

Noel Coward

While “queer” has so far survived as a word divorced from its homosexual connotation, it’s a different story for “gay.”  Though modern audiences will accept its old meaning in dated pieces [witness “I feel pretty, and witty, and gay” from West Side Story], no modern speaker or writer intending to convey the idea that someone is “happy” or “light hearted” would call him/her “gay.”  The word’s been swamped completely by historical developments.  Regret it though we might, “gay” can no longer be used to mean “happy.”  Never.  Nowhere.  If you try and use it that way your listener will get a confused message and unnecessary time and energy will be wasted trying to discern what is truly meant.  No one planning to be understood needs that kind of distraction. 

And—alas—people whose first or last name is “Gay” are in for a rough life.

 

Author Gay Talese and Wife

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Related Posts:

“Picking Your Battles: The Meaning of Words,” July 3, 2011

“Pronouncing ‘2012’,” December 31, 2011

“How To Stop Saying ‘You Know’,” April 28, 2012

“Naming Your Baby? Some Mistakes to Avoid,” May 30, 2012

A Guide to the Best of My Blog

I’ve created 220 posts since December of 2009 when I started this blog following my heart transplant (which occurred on November 23, 2009).  The posts are mini-essays on a number of topics, and I’ve tried to tie them together by adding a note at the end of each referring the reader to “Related Posts.”  But since there are a number of recurring subjects, it occurred to me that it might be a good idea to post a guide that organizes the blog according to topics, and what follows is my attempt to do this.

I want to thank the thousands of readers who take the time to read my blog.  It’s been terrific fun to write it and I plan to continue doing so (say once each week when possible) until illness or death prevents me from continuing.  When I do die I’ve given a final post to my nephew Adam Latek to put up on the internet so my readers will know it’s all over.  Until then, I particularly enjoy hearing from people with thoughts, questions, or stories about my blog posts, and it’s thrilling to learn that I may have helped some readers facing various complex difficulties such as coming out, missing promissory notes in mortgage foreclosures, dealing with a growing non-belief in religious ideas, etc.  My email address remains dglswhaley@aol.com.  If anyone finds errors in the dates, etc., below, please let me know and I’ll correct them. 

Here is the guide:  

1.  The Heart Transplant and Other Medical Matters

 

“New Year’s Party Without the Host,” January 7, 2010

"About That Heart Transplant," January 24, 2010
"My Heart Belonged to Andrew," February 17, 2010
"Another Letter to Andrew's Parents," March 10, 2010
"A Toast to Andrew," May 2, 2010
"Mama, Biopsies, and My iPad," May 19, 2010
"The First time I Nearly Died," August 3, 2010
"Rehabilitating Doug," June 12, 2010
"The Purring Heart," November 23, 2010
"1999-2001: A Dramatic Story, " December 15, 2010
"Naming My Heart," March 24, 2011
"Report on Old Doug: Health, Theater, eBook, and More," June 28, 2011
“The Ohio State Hospital Nurses: A Letter to President Gordon Gee,” July 21, 2011
"Mama Cat Saves My Life," October 23, 2011
"Walking Away From Death," February 29, 2012

"Doug Update: Health, Acting, Book Readings, and Snowbirding," September 6, 2012 

2.  Gay Issues

 

"The Aging Gay Rights Activist," March 24, 2010

"Frightening the Horses," April 4, 2010

“Homosexuality: The Iceberg Theory,” April 25, 2010
“How I Lost a Gay Marriage Debate,” April 29, 2010
“Straight Talk,” May 10, 2010
“Marijuana and Me,” July 11, 2010

“How To Tell if You’re Gay,” August 31, 2010

“The Thunderbolt,” September 3, 2010

“How To Change Gay People Into Straight People,” September 20, 2010

"How Many Homosexuals Are There in the World?" November 8, 2010
"Choose To Be Gay, Choose To Be Straight," January 25, 2011
"The Homosexual Agenda To Conquer the World," February 8, 2011
"Seducing Straight Men," March 3, 2011
"Coming Out: How To Tell People You're Gay," March 27, 2011
"Jumping the Broom: How 'Married' are Married Gay Couples?" July 17, 2011
"The Legacy of Homophobia," August 2, 2011

"Going Undercover at an Ex-Gay Meeting," September 19, 2011

"The Presumption of Heterosexuality and the Invisible Homosexual," October 2, 2011

"Gay Bashers, Homophobes, and Me," January 27, 2012

"On Being a Gay Sports Fan," March 9, 2012

"Sexual Labels: Straight, Gay, Bi," April 15, 2012
"The History of Gay Rights in Columbus, Ohio," June 4, 2012

“I Support the Right of the Boy Scouts To Ban Gays,” July 24, 2012

“Straight People: Thanks From the LGBT Community,” November 20, 2012

“Gay Marriage, DOMA, Proposition 8 and the Mysterious Supreme Court,” January 15, 2013 

3.  Atheism, Skepticism, and Religious Matters

 

“Catholicism and Me (Part One),” March 13, 2010

“Superstitions,” March 21, 2010

“Catholicism and Me (Part Two),” April 18, 2010

“How To Become an Atheist,” May 16, 2010

“Imaginary Friend,” June 22, 2010

“I Don’t Do Science,” July 2, 2010

“Explosion at Ohio Stadium,” October 9, 2010 (Chapter 1 of my novel)

“When Atheists Die,” October 17, 2010

"Escape From Ohio Stadium," November 2, 2010 (Chapter 2)

"Open Mouth, Insert Foot," November 21, 2010 (Chapter 3)

"Rock Around the Sun," December 31, 2010

"Muslim Atheist," March 16, 2011

"An Atheist Interviews God," May 20, 2011

"A Mormon Loses His Faith," June 13, 2011

"Is Evolution True?" July 13, 2011

"Atheists, Christmas, and Public Prayers," December 9, 2011

"An Atheist's Christmas Card," December 23, 2011

" Urban Meyer and the Christian Buckeye Football Team," February 19, 2012

"Intelligent Design, Unintelligent Designer?", May 12, 2012

"My Atheist Thriller: Another Book Reading," May 17, 2012

"The God Particle' and the Vanishing Role of God," July 5, 2012
“Update: Urban Meyer and the NON-Christian Buckeye Football Team,” August 24, 2012

“Atheists Visit the Creation Museum,” October 4, 2012

“Mitt Romney: A Mormon President?” October 17, 2012

“The End of the World: Mayans, Jesus, and Others,” December 17, 2012
"What Atheists Can Learn From the Gay Movement," February 4, 2013

“I Don’t Believe in Coincidences,” February 28, 2013

“Creating the Bible: Water Into Wine,” April 7, 2013

 

4.  Cats and Other Animals

"Parakeets and Me," February 5, 2010
“Bears,” February 23, 2010
"Mama, Biopsies, and My iPad," May 19, 2010
"Milking Cows," June 8, 2010
"Teaching English to Cats," August 6, 2010
"The Purring Heart," November 23, 2010
"The Dogs In My Life," April 18, 2011
“Dog Meat,” December 27, 2009
"My Parents and Dummy," May 13, 2011
"Two Cat Stories: Mama and Barney in the Wild," July 9, 2011

"Zoo Stories," August 30, 2011

“Mama Cat Saves My Life,” October 23, 2011

"Stepping on Cats," February 8, 2012

“Snowbirding, My iPhone 5, and the Coming Crazy Cat Trip,” December 5, 2012

“Barney and the Big Mammal Nightmare,” January 7, 2013 

5.  Family Stories

“My Competitive Parents,” January 20, 2010
"Goodbye to St. Paddy's Day," March 2, 2010
“Bob Whaley, Boy Lawyer,” March 28, 2010
"My Mother's Sense of Humor," April 4, 2010
“The Sayings of Robert Whaley,” May 13, 2010
“Bob Whaley and the Best Evidence Rule,” June 26, 2010
“Bob and Kink Get Married,” June 2, 2010
“Dad and the Cop Killer,” July 19, 2010
“No Pennies In My Pocket,” July 30, 2010
“Doug, Please Get My Clubs From the Trunk,” August 20, 2010

“The Death of Robert Whaley,” September 7, 2010

"My Missing Grandmother," December 26, 2010

"Bob Whaley Trapped in Panama," January 21, 2011

"The Death of My Mother," March 31, 2011 
"The Mack Problem: Saving My Parents' Marriage," August 10, 2011

6.  My Own History

“The Very Young Douglas Whaley,” October 11, 2010

“The Boot Camp Fiasco,” April 21, 2010

“Douglas Whaley, Deckhand,” December 22, 2010

“My Year in Bermuda,” February 9, 2010

“A Put-Out at Home Plate,” February 14, 2010

“The Many Faults of Douglas Whaley,” March 31, 2010

“How I Became a Law Professor,” January 27, 2010

“My Inadvertent Tattoo,” March 6, 2010

“Elena Kagan and Me,” March 23, 2010

“A Fanatic’s Tale (This Isn’t Pretty),” April 11, 2010

“Masa Comes for Xmas,” June 19, 2010

“A 1972 Corvette and the Whole Camel,” June 29, 2010

“Buying Moonshine in the Wilds of Tennessee,” July 23, 2010

“Recidivist: A Criminal Who Does It Again,” September 10, 2010
“Mary Beth and the Gay Teddy Bear,” September 25, 2010

“The Day Jerry Left,” October 30, 2010

“Doug, Take Me With You!” December 4, 2010

“The Marina City Party Crowd,” January 13, 2011

“The Duckball Team Goes to London,” January 29, 2011

“A Control Freak Turns 50 and Throws His Own Party,” May 2, 2011

“Going Through Puberty at Age 23,” May 23, 2011

“The Puppet Party,” June 17, 2011

“The Only Course I Ever Flunked,” July 25, 2011

“Gephyrophobia:  My Phobia of Crossing Bridges,” September, 28, 2011

“With Tim in San Francisco—1982/1983,” August 6, 2011

“On Being Lucky: The Second Anniversary of My Heart Transplant,” November 23, 2011

“Finding Bobby Startup,” December 5, 2011
"A Decision To Move to Florida," March 30, 2013

 

7.  Law and Stories About the Law

“How I Became a Law Professor,” January 27, 2010
“The Socratic Dialogue in Law School,” January 31, 2010
“Clickers,” March 17, 2010
“The Summer Bar Review Tours,” June 15, 2010
"Mortgage Foreclosures: The Disaster of Unintended Consequences," October 27, 2010
"Women in My Law School Classroom," January 8, 2011
"The Exploding Alarm Clock," February 19, 2011
"One More Story From Law School," February 27, 2011
"I Threaten To Sure Apple Over an iPad Cover," April 8, 2011
"Bob Whaley Goes to Law School," June 3, 2011
"The Payment-In-Full Check: A Powerful Legal Maneuver," April 11, 2011
"Adventures in the Law School Classroom," September 10, 2011
"What Non-Lawyers Should Know About Warranties," October 11, 2011
"How To Write an Effective Legal Threat Letter," October 19,2011
"Funny Law Professors," January 15, 2012
“How To Take a Law School Exam,” November 30, 2012”
"Mortgage Foreclosures, Missing Promissory Notes, and the Uniform Commercial Code: A New Article," February 11, 2013

“How To Pass the Bar Exam,” April 14, 2013 

8.  My Philosophy of Life

 

"Benjamin Franklin Riding Shotgun," May 29, 2010
“The Deathbed Test,” July 27, 2010

"How To Impress People In a Conversation," October 1, 2010

“How To Make Ethical Decisions,” December 12, 2010

"Rock Around the Sun," December 31, 2010

"The Left-Brain/Right-Brain Life," January 17, 2011

“Electricity and Cave Man Living,” February 4, 2011

“Life's Little (But Important) Rules,” April 23, 2011

“How To Be Perfect,” March 17, 2012

“How To Win Arguments and Change Someone’s Mind,” August 5, 2012

“Advice on Starting a New Job,” September 25, 2012

“Life’s Unexpected Pleasures: “¡Más Bueno Que El Pan!” November 5, 2012 

9.  Sex and Sensuality

“The Thunderbolt,” September 9, 2010

"How To Impress People In a Conversation," October 1, 2010

“Men, Women, and Pornography,” December 12, 2010

"The Left-Brain/Right-Brain Life," January 17, 2011

"Seducing Straight Men," March 3, 2011

“Life's Little (But Important) Rules,” April 23, 2011

“Good Sex, Bad Sex: Advice on Making Love,” November 9, 2011

“The Thrill of a Touch,” August 14, 2012

“Fifty Shades of Leather: Corbin Milk in the BDSM World,” December 26, 2012 

10.  My Novels

"Frightening the Horses," April 7, 2010

“Imaginary Friend,” June 22, 2010

“The Thunderbolt,” September 3, 2010

“Explosion at Ohio Stadium,” October 9, 2010 (Chapter One of my novel)

"Escape From Ohio Stadium," November 2, 2010 (Chapter Two)

"Open Mouth, Insert Foot," November 21, 2010 (Chapter Three)

“The Sugar Plum Fairy and the Hatchet Murderer,” March 13, 2011

"Report on Old Doug: Health, Theater, eBook, and More," June 28, 2011

"Mama Cat Saves My Life," October 23, 2011

"Needed: Readers of the Final Draft of my Novel ‘Corbin Milk’," December 13, 2011

"My Atheist Thriller: Another Bookreading," May 17, 2012

"Speed-Dating Agents As I Pitch My Novel at ThrillerFest 2012," July 17, 2012

“Doug Update: Health, Acting, Book Readings, and Snowbirding,” September 6, 2012

“Listen to Me Reading My Novel on the Radio,” December 11, 2012

“‘Imaginary Friend’ Goes International: A Bookreading of My Atheist Thriller in Nottingham, England, Via Skype,” March 19, 2013 

11.  On the Stage

 

“Douglas Whaley, Actor,” August 14, 2010

"Directing 'Closure'," June 5, 2010

“I Am an 89 Year-Old Russian Jew,” January 31, 2011

“Another Opening, Another Show: Doug is in ‘Hamlet,’” April 29, 2011

“Acting Crazy: Doug in a New Show,” October 25, 2012 

12.  Gambling

"Far Too High in Las Vegas," September 1, 2010

"Playing Blackjack With an Old Chinese Woman," April 3, 2011

      
 "How To Play Craps Vegas Style," April 15, 2011

 

 

 

 13.  My Ex-Wife Charleyne

"I Married a Hippy," April 14, 2010

"Far Too High in Las Vegas," September 1, 2010

"Charleyne and the Giant Cookie," September 16, 2010

"Bowling With Charleyne," February  13, 2011

"The Cheesecake Incident in Williamsburg, Virginia," January 6, 2012

 

14.  Politics

“Ohio To Put Guns in Baby Strollers,” June 17, 2012

“Obamacare, John Roberts, and the Supreme Court,” July 3, 2012

“Supreme Court Overturns Roe v. Wade,” August 17, 2012

“President Mitt Romney?” April 21, 2012

“Mitt Romney, Leveraged Buyouts, and Morality,” September 12, 2012

“Mitt Romney: A Mormon President?” October 17, 2012

 

15.  Odds and Ends

"Strange Songs, Inc.," September29, 2010
"The Evil Big Birthday Song," November 5, 2010

"'The Carolers': A Comic Christmas Song," December 7, 2010

“How to Take a (or Many) Pills Easily,” May 26, 2010

“The Best of My Library,” August 27, 2010

“Football Advice for Coach Jim Tressel,” October 23, 2010

“Doug’s Favorite Jokes,” November 13, 2010

“Fear of Public Speaking and How To Overcome It,” January 4, 2011

“Basketball and Its Announcers,” March 6, 2011

“Five Movies I Watch Again and Again,” March 20, 2011

“Some Cartoons I’ve Saved,” October 20, 2010

“The World's Greatest Game [Bridge] Needs You,” June 20, 2011
“Picking Your Battles: The Meaning of Words,” July 3, 2011

“Potpourri #1,” November 15, 2011

“Pronouncing ‘2012’,” December 31, 2011

“I Hate Meetings,” October 31, 2011

“How To Stop Saying ‘You Know’,” April 28, 2012

“Naming Your Baby?  Some Mistakes to Avoid,” May 30, 2012

How To Pass the Bar Exam

Earlier in my teaching career I gave bar review lectures all over the country for a ten year period.  Thus I witnessed thousands of people facing bar exams, heard their concerns, gave them advice, and eventually developed a min-lecture I threw into the mix containing my advice on taking bar exams.  That lecture, somewhat developed, is below, but if some of it sounds familiar to readers of this blog it may be because a couple of thoughts are taken word for word from a prior post dealing with a similar topic: “How To Take a Law School Exam” (November 30, 2012).  It certainly won’t hurt you to read them again.

A.  Before the Bar Exam

1. Calm yourself down.  Yes it’s the most important exam you will ever take in your life.  But, for the reasons I explain below, you are highly likely to sail right through the experience so that in a few months you will be raising you hand and swearing to be a respectable member of the bar.  If you graduated from a good law school and passed all of your course with no danger of flunking them or even making a “D” your chances of passing the bar are excellent even if you do little studying for it (which would be a bad decision).  If you graduated from any accredited law school you likely got a first rate education in the principles of the law, and, again, the bar exam should be a small (if unpleasant) hill to climb, nothing like Mt. Everest.

 

So (deep breath) this is going to happen and is almost certainly going to end well.

2.  Study smart.  Okay, studying is hard work, but whoever said you only get to do easy things in life? This is your chosen profession—right?—so it deserves the effort necessary to acquire the knowledge to begin your career.  You should take a bar review course, go to the lectures, study the guides, but—and this is a major “but”—you should do so with a new goal in mind.

If your goal on the bar exam is to memorize all the law that might possibly be tested, that's of course impossible, and you might as well quit now.  No one could do that.  In law school your goal (rightfully) was to make the highest grade you could on every exam you took.  But on the bar exam (happily) your goal is very different.  You don’t need to ace this exam. You only need to make a passing grade.  That leads to altered study tactics.  

Look at the list of the subjects tested on the bar and divide them into categories: (a) subjects I understood, liked, and did well in, (b) subjects I understood and with a review can bring back into temporary mastery, (c) subjects I can learn enough to get by, and (d) subjects where I don’t have a chance of gaining the knowledge necessary to do well when asked about this subject on the bar exam.  For items in category (a) brushing up is all that is necessary.  For (b) you need to concentrate to regain information you once had and bring it back into service.  For (c) pay attention to the fundamentals and ignore everything else.  And for (d) do nothing.

What?  Yes, nothing.  When I give this advice I’m assuming (d) consists of one or two subjects you never had in law school, subjects that are complex, and subjects that if you flunk them are not going to keep you from passing the bar.  Let me give you examples of (d). 

I have taken two bar exams in my life: Illinois in 1968 immediately after I graduated from law school and moved to Chicago, and Indiana two years later when I moved to Indianapolis to begin teaching at the Indiana Indianapolis School of Law.  For the first exam I signed up for and religiously attended a bar review course, read the materials, and passed the exam.  For the second I was teaching law (Contracts and Commercial Law subjects) and I decided not to take another bar review course.  I made this decision for two reasons.  First, I was not that far removed from having just taken that first bar review course and even still had my materials.  Secondly, as I made the decision I was grading the exams of third year students who would be my competitors and I remember thinking, immodestly, “with one hand tied behind my back” I could best their collective efforts on the exam.  The Indiana bar exam, however, had two subjects on it that were not tested in Illinois: Tax and Labor Law.  I had had courses at the University of Texas Law School in both subjects, but I remembered almost nothing about either.  I also decided not to study either, and just devoted myself to reviewing the things that fit in categories (a), (b), and (c) above.  As a consequence the bar examiner who graded my essay exams on these two subjects likely concluded that I’d flunk the exam.  Ah, but the examiners who graded my answers to the Contracts and Commercial Law questions (which took up a much larger part of the exam) assumed I earned the top grade given that year on the exam.  The truth was somewhere in between, comfortably above the pass line.

So you can “punt” on a subject or two, particularly if they are not key components of the exam (such as the core courses every law school offers in the first and second years). 

3. The night before the exam: GET A GOOD NIGHT’S SLEEP! One of the major things you’ll be tested on is how well your brain works. If you spent the night cramming for the exam with coffee, drugs, or who know what, your brain will be fried and your exam performance dismal. A rested brain is more important than any last minute knowledge gained.

 

4. If Big Things Go Wrong. What if the unexpected happens—you get sick, a family member dies, you receive a distress call from your best friend to fly across country and rescue him/her—should you postpone the exam? Obviously things can occur that would keep any rational person from taking the exam on time, and I’m not saying otherwise. But here should be your rule: if it is at all possible to take the exam, do so. I’ve too often seen students with the opposite attitude (“I hope something comes up so I can duck the exam!”). A postponed bar exam has a way of never getting done. I’ve known legal careers wrecked because the postponement of the exam was the end of everything.  Don’t let that happen.  Take the damn exam and get it over with.

Call if off only if that is the only rational choice.  There was man who was very sick but nonetheless took the Indiana exam, toughing it out, finishing the whole thing, and then returned after the end of the final day to his hotel room, and died in his sleep.  He was subsequently admitted to the bar, but it was a posthumous honor—not at all what he’ad been planning on.

5. If Little Things Go Wrong. You need to consider ahead of time the small matters that can turn the exam experience into a nightmare, and develop fail-safe backups. I’m referring to such things as getting the date or time of the exam wrong, the alarm clock that doesn’t go off, the car that won’t start, the pen or computer that won’t work, etc.  One year in Ohio an applicant thought that the three day exam started on a Wednesday when it really started on a Tuesday.  Major mistake, that. 

 

 

When I took the Illinois bar exam, on the second day thereof, my alarm clock failed to go off, and I’d have slept right through much of the morning session but for the fact that my phone rang at 8 a.m.  It was a friend of mine asking if I’d seen the morning paper: the Russians had invaded Czechoslovakia.  I was very sorry for Czechoslovakia, but I was delighted by that phone call.  So you might think ahead how a little help from your friends can be useful in making sure you don’t have unnecessary problems with the only bar exam you plan on ever taking. 

Make sure your understand well ahead of time all the rules of the exam, particularly what you’re allowed to bring with you into the exam and what not, and how to turn in the exam. Learn the honor code and pay attention to its rules.  

B.  Taking the Bar Exam

1. Fill out the exam as instructed. When the starting signal is given, first set up your time schedule. DON'T MAKE MISTAKES ABOUT THIS.

 

2. The Questions. 

There will be good moments in the bar exam, for example a question on the subject of your seminar paper, or concentrating on your favorite subject in which you made your top grade in law school.  Treasure these moments, but don’t dwell on their glory.  Smile, nail it, and move one. 

On objective questions guess unless told that there are penalties for so doing. (If enough people miss the same objective question the graders will frequently throw it out—so get in there and do your share by missing it too).

On essay questions, read each question carefully, trying to get a sense of its bigger meaning. Issues will jump out at you. This will give you a sense of relief, but it’s no time to relax. Now re-read the question carefully, underlining important points, making marginal notes about the issues or thoughts you want to include. Don't assume away the hard parts and make the exam too easy. This isn't a contest of wits; it's a performance, and you’ll get few points for evading the hard issues.

Don't repeat the facts except as necessary to your analysis. Unnecessarily repeating the facts is a waste of precious time. Good attorneys, however, do use the facts to make their points (“The plaintiff chose to send an email because it was faster than the postal service, thus showing the plaintiff's emphasis on speed”).

What issue should you start with if there’s more than one in a question? Here’s valuable advice: start with the most important issue, the most vital one, the one at the heart of it all. One of the things being tested is whether you can spot what’s vital. If your answer starts with something petty that no lawyer is going to spend much time on, this tells the examiner you don’t know what’s important and what’s not, a bad message to convey. The exam has so much time pressure that if you mustn’t spend your valuable minutes on minutia; you must  hone in on the heart of a controversy.

On essay questions, if you don't know, fake it. What? Yes, fake it. Pretend you’re the monarch of your own jurisdiction and boldly invent the rules. Our law is not so perverse that it deviates much from common assumptions, and your guess will often get you some points, whereas a blank sheet of paper will get you nothing. Some of you reading this are very, very good at this skill, having honed it through years of educational endeavors, and it’s time to strut your stuff.

On the usual law school exams you have time for exploration of lots of things: policy, minor arguments, etc.  But not the bar exam.  The examiners are busy people with large stacks of papers to grade.  They are looking at essay exams with one question only foremost in their minds: what sort of lawyer will this applicant make.  Does he/she know the black letter rules of law and how to apply them?  Therefore make sure you do state all the black latter rules of law as clearly as you can, apply them well, and throw in a policy statement only if you have time.  Keep saying to yourself, “Law, law, law.”  Demonstrate your knowledge of the law.  If you have a pertinent real life comment about what a real lawyer would do (settle this turkey, for example) state that if you are sure it’s right.  Show the examiner what a stellar attorney you will be.

C.  After the Bar Exam

1. If you have more parts of the exam yet to take, stop any thoughts or discussions about this part of the exam immediately and concentrate on the upcoming ones. Panic later, when the complete exam is over.

2. Very important rule: don't do postmortems on the exam by discussing questions with the other applicants. Violating this rule is a sure way to panic yourself. Taken collectively you all know more than any one of you knows individually, so if you want to scare yourself good about the only bar exam you’re ever planning on taking, postmortems are a sure way to do it. If someone starts to talk about the bar exam to you (“Did you see the promissory estoppel issue in question two?”) walk away quickly. You don’t need to hear things you may have missed. Go out and have a drink with non-law students.  Have several.  You have months of waiting ahead of you.  Fill those moments with constructive things, and forget the exam until the happy moment arrives when the results are posted and you learn that you’ve passed.  Then throw a party.  It’s likely you really have just taken your last exam.  That’s worth celebrating.

3. Swearing In Ceremony.  One of the happiest moments of your life is raising your hand and taking the oath that turns you into a lawyer.  Consider that your entire education, starting in pre-school, has led you to this event.  Everyone who loves you will congratulate you.  They should.  Congratulate yourself. 
 

 

 So, good luck with this pesky bar exam and with the career that awaits you in the life of the law.  I’m rooting for you.

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Related Posts:

“How I Became a Law Professor,” January 27, 2010

“The Summer Bar Review Tours,” June 15, 2010

"I Threaten To Sure Apple Over an iPad Cover," April 8, 2011

"How To Write and Effective Legal Threat Letter," October 19, 2011
"Funny Law Professors," January 15, 2012

“How To Take a Law School Exam,” November 30, 2012