I’ve been working as an articled student at a large law firm for over two months now. In that time, I’ve done very complex and interesting things, such as write memos, conduct due diligence searches, write memos, walk papers to the courthouse, write memos, pick up cheques, and write memos. Sometimes I wonder if making the jump from public to private practice wasn’t such a hot idea. I used to be in court everyday, working decent hours, and now I slave away in an office for 10-12 hours a day.

There is also the fear that I will not get hired back as a junior associate. What sucks is that even after the grueling process for landing an articling position, I still have to worry about receiving a coveted associate position. This is not something American law students have to deal with, as there is no such thing as articling in the US; you get to be an associate as soon as you’re hired. In Canada, the articling period exists seemingly to allow law firms to ride students just like Cuba Gooding, Jr., rode those Alaskan snow dogs in the aptly titled Disney film Snow Dogs, cracking the proverbial whip to make us do incredibly menial tasks at extremely low pay. And articled students chomp at the bit to deliver documents to opposing counsel, to draft a pleading, to highlight and tab cases so the “real” lawyer doesn’t get a paper cut.

Do I sound bitter? I sound bitter. It’s always easy to harp on the uncontrollable and annoying things in your situation than simply to relax and enjoy the great parts of it—alternative backyards having a richer jade hue, or whatever I overhead that Japanese tourist’s translation machine say on the bus today. I know that I am learning important skills as well. I find satisfaction in a lot of my work: researching an issue inside and out and making a winning argument; figuring out an answer that the main lawyer couldn’t come up with; getting valuable advice from top lawyers who have spent their entire careers being awesome.

I recently got an apartment that I officially move into in February. It’s close to work, downtown, my friends, the beach, and the mountains. Now all I have to do is fill it up with stuff. Even though I feel like a child struggling to learn my ABCs at times during my articles, I am comforted by the thought that this is really just the first step in my career, the first chapter in a story that I get to write however I want. I hope that means I end up married to Robert Downey, Jr.