Hiding Out and Swearing In

I swear-in to the bar on Friday.  I might "go it alone," unless one or two friends come to support me.  Most of my friends are "repeaters," and it may be too painful for them to come because they are not swearing in, too.  I understand.  It's a bitter-sweet moment for them.

I was not able, financially, to keep repeating the bar exam every 6-months.  Thus, having taken the bar exam once a year, for the past three years, I have realized - as of now - that I have lost many friends, friends that I thought would be friends for life.  I have lost these friends not due to anything that they did, but due to solely to me.  I hid out from them because I was ashamed and demoralized at my failure to pass the bar exam.  I did not want to discuss why I had not passed the exam.  I did not want to be patronized by someone who hadn't walked in my shoes.

Now, having sent out invitations to my swearing-in celebration, and watching the "No" I can't attend as the RSVP's arrive, my friends are probably wondering why they have received an invitation after three years of near silence.  It stings a bit, but perhaps it's also time to make new friends.  My life is no longer "hanging in the balance."  Instead, my life is going down a brand new path. . .

Robert Frost, "The Road Not Taken."

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.