2 Weeks In

Today was officially the two week mark at the new job. (Also, sidenote, March 4 was my 9 yr anniversary of being a public defender) It is definitely different at my new location than literally every other place I have practiced law. So I'm trying hard to learn the way this court system operates.

I have had a couple of interesting interactions with prosecutors so far. Today I called a pros to talk about our cases for tmrw. I introduced myself & explained that I was new to the office. We started talking about the cases & she asked me suddenly where I had been before coming here. I said I had been in another PD office for 9 years. She said, "Oh that male sense. You don't sound like you're a brand new attorney." So that made me feel a bit better about being new--at least I don't come off like I have no idea what I'm doing.

The other conversation was yesterday when I was discussing a request I'd made with a different pros. It's a crim sex case with a juvenile alleged victim so there was a forensic interview done. I've had that in cases before & the interviewers typically have specific training on how to conduct these interviews. One of the things I do in those cases is I request is the training materials & guidelines they use in these interviews. I check their best practices against the interview in my case bc if the interview is done improperly, it can lead to false allegations. Naturally I want to explore that.

So I had requested that in this case & i was talking to the prosecutor about it. She was unsure what I was looking for so I tried to explain it more. She said she'd have to look into it & then mentioned that no one had ever asked her for that before. I made a joke about just getting here & already rocking the boat. Her response was, "No! It's great, I'm impressed. Very thorough!" Nice to hear that I'm making a good first impression.

I did think it was weird that no one else had ever asked for it before. That's such a routine request to me that I was surprised it wasn't for everyone.

So far, things are going really well. I'm happy on a daily basis, which is not something I have felt in a long time. And I'm pushing myself to come out of my socially anxious shell & do things that scare me. Today was my first day in court since starting & i had no idea how things worked. I was getting anxious & panicky but I gritted my teeth & walked up to the clerk & introduced myself. I said I was new & had a few questions & she was friendly & helpful & everything went smoothly. It may not seem like much but for me, that's my nightmare. So being able to just push through it was a big accomplishment!

I'm very happy right now. I'm not used to it. But I like it.