On occasion, I struggle with a topic for my blog post. Occasionally, it is because my cases and workload do not give me an opportunity to consider a topic that I can really get behind. Sometimes it is because I have an upcoming vacation or event which hinders my ability to focus.

Right now, it’s a little bit of both.

The month of May has been a whirlwind of trials and court appearances for me. It began with an amuse bouche mechanic’s lien in Baltimore City Circuit Court, followed by an argument at the Court of Special Appeals as an appetizer and a bench trial in the Circuit Court for Baltimore County as the main course. This week,  a district court trial served as the dessert for my cornucopia of court appearances in May.

Much like any litigator, my trial schedule ebbs and flows, and I anticipated this month would be especially busy. For me, the finish line was Memorial Day Weekend, with an anticipated four days of uninterrupted inactivity (i.e. no work).

I develop a fairly normal routine when faced with several weeks (or months) when my workload is crushing. It’s really a balance of work, spending time with the family and exercise during the week, sprinkled with weekends filled with work, spending time with the family and exercise.

But four days off with nothing to do, after several weeks of always having something to do, sounds glorious. The problem? Vacation brain. I start to think about the time off before actually taking the time off.  While this is not a week-long vacation, it’s a welcome (albeit short) respite before the craziness of the summer starts.

To combat this issue, I make of list of everything that needs to be done before I leave and what can wait until I get back.  I get coverage for anything that may come up and tell clients that I will be out for the prescribe period of time. It’s not rocket science, but it just needs to be done.

All you need to do is get through the shortened week, which somehow I did. Hopefully my next blog post will have some sort of epiphany about the practice of law or a tidbit of legal advice.  In the meantime, I hope everyone gets their long weekend of non-work related joy.

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If life were a comic book, I’d wager that many of you are around the point in the hero’s origin story when you feel like you have to choose what path you want your life to take. And if you’re anything like the best comic book characters, that choice terrifies you.

Why? Because even though you now have all these wonderful skills at your disposal, the sheer enormity of the possible futures in front of you dwarfs everything else you’ve encountered.

How do I know this? Because I am you. And I’m going through the same uncertainty right now.

I graduated from the University of Baltimore School of Law and subsequently passed Maryland’s bar exam in 2010. Since then, I have opened a small law office in Towson, currently work as a policy assistant with some of Maryland’s state senators in Annapolis and I have tried to balance all that while maintaining my relationships with friends and family—particularly in my new role as uncle to an amazing 2-year-old nephew.

And so I stand at a crossroads, asking myself the same kinds of questions you are likely asking yourselves right now:

Do I step down from my legislative position in order to focus more on building my own law practice? Do I stay in Annapolis and try to advance my legislative career at the expense of my legal career? Or do I drop both if an opportunity presents itself in criminal prosecution, the field I’ve sought to work in since my second-year law clinic?

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I don’t “practice” law. I don’t work in a firm or prepare briefs, nor do I have any desire to ever set foot in a courtroom. In fact, I often tell people it was never my intention to become a lawyer when I went to law school. But I am a lawyer; I’m an advocate for my clients, albeit in a different setting. As a lobbyist, my job is to facilitate or prevent changes to the law that will benefit or hurt my clients.

I was a lobbyist before law school and went to law school basically to become a better, and presumably higher paid, lobbyist. Law school for me was one of those “I’ve always wanted to do this” things. When I found a career I enjoyed, I knew going to law school would make me a better professional and a better advocate.

And it did. I can say that it makes a difference. Legislators in Annapolis or their staffs (especially those who are JDs) find it a little easier to discuss a complex change they are trying to make to the Maryland Code if they know they are speaking to a lawyer.

Likewise, the confidence I gained through law school allows me to go toe-to-toe with other lawyer-lobbyists. I speak the language, you could say, and even though I don’t practice law in any traditional sense, being fluent (OK, let’s not kid myself – conversational) the language of the law is a very valuable thing.

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Multitasking at home or in the office has pretty much become an accepted part of life. Many job descriptions even include “ability to multitask” among the requirements for the position, and it’s generally thought of as good and helpful skill.

But a local management consultant says multitasking is not a good thing.

Jodi Daniels says that despite the fact that it has become professionally acceptable to multitask at work, multitasking does not lead to a more effective workforce or product. Even though employers and employees may think that they are getting more work done, work quality suffers because an employee who multitasks essentially is a distracted employee. In fact, Daniels says, the better a person thinks they are at multitasking, the worse they actually are at it.

I have mixed feelings about multitasking but I mostly agree with Daniels. As far as taking on certain tasks at the same time, I have found that regardless of how good I actually am at it (and I’m pretty sure I’m not), I just don’t like it. One of the big ones for me is the phone: that is, talking on the phone while I’m on the computer or checking my phone during face-to-face conversations. I just don’t feel like I can give my attention to both tasks and I don’t like doing it. Plus, we’ve all been in the situation where someone is doing this to us. It’s usually fairly obvious they’re doing it and, depending on the situation, it can get annoying.

But it can be difficult to force yourself to concentrate on one thing at a time, especially if you have a lot to do or if certain things on your to-do list are more routine tasks that don’t necessarily require your full attention.

In some ways I like multitasking. It’s always been easier for me to get things done when I have a lot on my plate. I can move on to another project for a bit if I hit a tough spot in the project I’m working on so I never feel “stuck”, so to speak.

How do you feel about multitasking? Do you have any tips for doing it successfully?

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If someone told me when I was a senior in college that I would go to law school, I would have said that that person was crazy.

Some attorneys knew at a young age that they wanted to practice law. Others, like myself, acquired the “esquire” title via the Robert Frost route.

I moved to New York City after graduating college, first working at a design studio alongside out-of-work actors while selling my family’s mushrooms (we have the last commercial mushroom farm in New York) at the Greenmarket on Saturdays to supplement my income as I continued to look for full-time employment.

I ended up taking the New York real estate licensing exam and became a baby agent minnow in the shark tank of Manhattan commercial real estate, which became a crash course in life lessons. In 2008, when the market turned, I rode back home on the mushroom truck, resumed my seasonal garden business and began to regroup.

I thought graduate school would be a good way to wait out the economy and, while I loved my major, it wasn’t tremendously marketable on its own. I reasoned that a law degree would create the widest spectrum of opportunity, not only in the way of building analytical and critical thinking skills but also because when you pass the bar, you are able to do a variety of things that you could not without your license.

Given my less-than-traditional path, I have found that most prospective employers aren’t quite sure how to handle my resume. “So, you started a garden design business, majored in international agriculture and rural development, worked as a commercial real estate agent, then law school, and now you’re telling me you want to practice transactional law?” [Cue Desi Arnaz: Justine, you got some 'splainin to do!] At times, even I struggle with explaining my varied path.

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The legal profession is notorious for demanding your full and complete devotion, sometimes every waking hour of every day. As full-time lawyer and a mother of two young children with an amazingly supportive husband, sometimes I feel like I am not doing enough in the mothering department.

Work-life balance debates and societal expectations aside, though, I think it is the kids’ perspective that counts the most. What matters to me is that my kids are happy, healthy, safe and that they know that I love them.

My daughter made a fill-in the blank “All About My Mom” letter in school earlier this week.  She left it on my keyboard at home, because she knew that was the first place I would look when I got home. The whole thing was adorable, but a couple of her answers really stuck out to me:

My mom always tells me: “I love you.”

It makes my mom happy when: she sees us. 

I love my mom because: she’s so sweet.

As long as that is her perspective, I must be doing something right. And that is good enough for me.

(Photo: Crazy Yet Wise)

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