To start this thing off for the year, I’m going to share a bit about how I got to law school. I ask that others then share their own stories. I know from talking to my own classmates over the last couple of years that there are very interesting stories out there about past lives and reasons for coming here. We’ve had military, business, and political types, do-gooders, out-for-profits, and rappers-cum-salesmen in my time at the WVU CoL. I’m sure each class has such stories.
So, how’d you get here? What’d you do before? Why law school and why WVU?
For now, though, here’s a letter of resignation written in anticipation of applying to law school, written to end one chapter full of poor to mediocre decisions and to begin a new chapter, hopefully one of more promise. I wrote it for kicks; I share it for kicks. It is also important to mention that it was written on July 4th. You’ll get it.
July 4, 2011
To whom it may concern:
On this, our nation’s Independence Day, I hereby declare my own independence. I declare independence from wage labor as I have suffered it. For nearly a year, now, the fight from paycheck to paycheck has taken its toll but it has not beaten me. No. Rather this struggle has stiffened my resolve to fight on. This fight, I now appreciate, must for me go beyond the doors of the BYP, however. Although this cause must always be fought out in establishments of whatever repute—from the heights of the BYP, way, way down to that basement, the Cue—my part here in this particular ale house is finished. The fight must be taken farther and further by each of us in our own way and our own time. And I intend to do just that. The way is unknown to me, but the time, my time, is most assuredly now.
So, as our forefathers published to their unjust masters, so too must I put on record my own intentions to break free. Today, the Fourth of July, 2011, I give two weeks’ notice: the eighteenth of July, 2011, will be my last day working as I have for the BYP, LLC. These last two weeks will no doubt test my resolve to its limit. But, as Adams and Jefferson and Hancock all knew well, an individual’s resolve can be bent if kept to one’s self; once published, however, that resolve is reinforced not only by that man’s individual convictions, but also by his desire to not fail or falter in the eyes of his fellow man—by his vanity, in short. Therefore, this notice of two weeks is meant in form for those at theBYP who may concern themselves with its message—namely, that individual concerned with the subsequent need to hire another in my stead—but in purpose is meant, in fact, to concrete the decision I’ve taken.
As Adams put before his brothers of the Revolution, “We cannot insure success, but we can deserve it.” Thus the future holds perhaps success and perhaps failure. But either will be attained on my own terms and not for such per hour. The fight will go on, and I at its forefront. Thx. Xoxo.
Later, thank God, I applied to law school. How’d you get here?
Please send your story or a few lines of an idea for any story or blog to james.berkeley@hotmail.com. Thx. Xoxo.
Finally, below are links to two wildly different, though equally inspirational, speeches that seem relevant enough to the above:
“We shall fight them on the beaches.” —Churchill https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkTw3_PmKtc
“We’re going to live on! We’re going to survive! Today, we celebrate our Independence Day!” —Pullman (as Pres. Whitmore) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoLywiaM6PA
