Count Down to Graduation--Last Time to Recite in Class

I passed another milestone tonight on the way to graduation. I had to "recite" for the last time. It is hard to put into words what that means. Speaking in class goes all the way back to first year, when one of our teachers still used the Socratic method to terrorize us. (It was scary, but admittedly energizing in some odd way.) I wasn't sure, however, I was hearing anything in his class--I was always skimming the case ahead trying to review the facts in the event he called on me to brief it. It was an unnerving experience. It was never that bad again in any course. But even if you had been assigned a case to talk about, and you knew when you had to deliver it, it was still unnerving. You never have enough time to read everything you need to read, or to uncover every fact, or point of law. You are never sure you aren't going to look dumb. Or unprepared. Both are death. I had volunteered to give a presentation tonight for extra credit. I had a boring subject to talk about and I feel like I bored the class with it. But hey! It is five extra credit points that I need, and it signaled a rite of passage. The end of classroom talking.