why law?

The other day I was confronted with a contemptuous question (by the way it was asked) " Why do you study law? Money? Stable income?"

This was from an old acquaintance from the old journalism school days, who is now an aspiring author, playwright, proud and "financially independent" living in one of the most expensive cities in China. And I, by coincidence, just gave up my comfortable job one year ago and the book that I professed to be writing has never gone beyond Chapter III. And now I'm studying law, and suprised myself by my dedication and hardwork. So why?

I actually don't have a single-pointed answer for this. When I started, I had many hestitations and justifications which balanced themselves out. Money (perhaps and greed are a convenient association with certain unfortunate professions) was an appeal to start with, but not so much a temptation in a secure and "fair dinkum" country anyway. I have all the lifestyle that I ever hoped for. In a typical stereotype, being a stressed-out lawyer might as well bring ruins to my lazy life on some of the world's most beautiful beaches. Come to think of it, what a bummer!!

Nonetheless, the study was a plain sailing for me and a good beginning if one's performance can be measured by marks. So I guess then I just tagged along quite happily as though I'm destined for this. The law study has everything that I wanted: mental stimuli, satisfaction, a career to build up on...and stories upon stories that I might draw upon in creative writing as my torts lecturer, a very entertaining Chinese Aussie once put it and I quote "facts are stranger than fictions". After all, "words" are what I'm dealing with one way or another.

Law is in fact also an intellectual way of living(maybe not really in my m/land), making meticulous science out of common sense. It is directed and guided but is never rigidly formularised. There is always room to manoeuver in and facts to argue about. I enjoy hearing novel arguments and marvel at the limit of my insight. It's fair to say that some people after reaching a certain stage stop heeding the fact that they have limitations. They may become way too content to learn, too righteous to be challenged, or too comfortable to be changed. I was almost on the edge of becoming like that, but I voted myself out. I'd rather be brain dead studying law than brain rusted doing an average work.

Now I need to go back to my torts notes. My poor mate Ki msged that she couldn't sleep now. If I don't get torts done soon, I'll be on the same boat.