I’ve never quite belonged in law school. I was told when I started the application process – and many times since – that I’m a ‘non-traditional’ student, which seemed mainly to mean that I was older than everybody else. I didn’t mind; I am older than everybody else. But before law school I never thought of myself as non-traditional. Or old, for that matter. Now it feels like I’m inescapably both, whether I like it or not.

Law school is hard enough without being told you don’t ‘really’ fit in – and that’s ultimately what being ‘non-traditional’ means. You don’t fit in. And in truth, I don’t. For one thing, people call me by my first name here all the time. Outside of a doctor’s office or Starbucks, I haven’t heard my first name this much in twenty years. It was always “Professor Deere,” or “Dr. Deere,” or just…Deere. Which is what I was before all this first-name calling business.