THE JOURNEY TO MORDOR

“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.” ~ Bilbo Baggins

The world is a dangerous place but not like the ones you see in the movies; last I checked,
there are no Nazgul or dragons outside my door. However, we can learn a lot from the hobbits and their resilience to accomplish a meaningful purpose. Much like Tolkien’s realm, the criminal law landscape has a variety of environments such as the types of charges, clients, and even self-growth that one will inevitably encounter.

For myself, Frodo’s character is very familiar in that he was initially wracked with fear and doubt about the obstacles he was going to face. Yet despite his background, he proves himself to be one of the greatest heroes in the trilogy. Though I will never encounter the decision to throw an evil ring into a fiery pit, I will be facing my own obstacles in the form of a steep learning curve. When I first entered law school, I was swept by the idea of wanting to do civil law and entertaining dreams of entering into insurance law, a familiar subject that was a comfortable fallback.

Rather, like Frodo I discovered that by staying in the Shire, or in my case an area of
comfortability, I would not satisfy the journey calling me to do criminal law. In my last year as a law student, I chose to pursue my articles with Guillaume, a well-distinguished, kind, and knowledgeable lawyer. I hope that I am able to learn from this journey just as Frodo learned from Gandalf and the fellowship around him. As I start this journey, I know that there will be ups and downs in my learning but I will not let that stop me from doing my best as an articling student. And so, as I begin this journey I start hopeful and ready to encounter anything that comes my way outside of the Shire.