HANGING IN THE BALANCE

        I am literally counting days this time. It was about 2 weeks ago when I received an unsolicited text message that the Bar Examination results will be released sooner than I expected. Thirty four percent (34%) of the examinees have made it so it says. From that day on, I felt fidgety most of the time wondering whether the purported percentage of those who passed the bar has justified the dubious modification in the sort of examination administered to our batch – the 60% MCQ-type and 40% legal-opinion-writing-and-memorandum-writing-type of the exam. Much to the gusto of most bar candidates (I am having a reservation to include myself), this was made effective and so some, if not all, took the exam as though taking a college entrance test. It goes without saying that it was quite challenging although I suppose some examinees would be surreptitiously celebrating victory which is yet to be proved until the publication of the results thereof.


        Clearly, what concerns me is whether or not I pass the bar, period. Along with the six thousand or so bar candidates flooding the grounds of UST all the way to the rooms designated for them, I was just an anonymous hopeful. I sought not a banner from my humble school waving in the air wishing all the best for its own “barristers” (unlike other schools staging grandiose commendations for their bar candidates on the roadside). Neither did I seek the presence of some friends and family members who insisted in going to the examination venue on the first and the last Sunday of November only to see me dog-tired after the laborious task of hurdling the bar. I only sought the help of God Almighty to give me courage and to uplift the dignity that is left in me to proceed with the test amidst all the blunders I committed along the way.


       Yes, while taking the exam, I couldn’t help but remember all the blunders I committed during my days in the college of law. All the embarrassing and outrageous moments in the classroom while trying to articulate some provisions which I have yet to process in my shrinking brain were all prowling inside of me, dispossessing me of the little confidence I have in myself. Of course these are all exaggerations, but the thing is, you can only do so much when people around you are highly expecting that you will make it, putting you on the pedestal and calling you “attorney” even before you see your name in the roster of newly-passed lawyers. Thoughts like those make me feverish these days. I don’t know how I will be handling the situation comes the “judgment day”.


       But I remain hopeful. My life may be hanging in the balance right now but I remain as hopeful as I can be. What comes next is still something that I have to figure out. May God grant me the strength to accept whatever be the outcome.