October 10, 1973 (Letter from Tony)

Yes, here I am at last, the wayward Western wanderer finally writing.  Thank you for your letter for I usually do need a small push to help over come my inertia.

It certainly is a shame that education at college-level and higher cannot be somewhat more stimulating than it is.  I can rationalize some of the drudgery as a means to the end of developing discipline and bringing my expectations of my life down to manageable goals, but it does seem that they go a bit overboard in laying on the tedium.  Certainly my last year here at Boalt was not an enjoyable one, but it was also far from unproductive.

Since I had a lot of time  this past summer to re-think on what had gone on, I was able to prepare myself much better for this year and also for what lies ahead in my life.

You ask if I noticed a moodiness on your part.  I had to laugh, for I felt that many hours of this past summer, which were part of my re-evaluation, found me to be almost anti-social, or at least far from talkative or friendly.  During our trip to Spread Eagle this mood of mine was quite strong.  I realized that my quietness had a somewhat deleterious effect on the social situation I was in, but I was in no "mood" to adjust my behavior.

Well, anyway, my 1st year of law school is now history, and with the wisdom gleaned from that year I have vowed never to allow myself to drop into such a depressed mental state again.  Those attributes you are working to maintain, a sense of humor being the chief one, were lost by me for lengthy periods of time and were not firmly established again until the end of the semester.

So far this school year has been very enjoyable.  I've been doing things, such as backpacking in Yosemite, visiting the ocean, walking around a redwood grave, spending a day out in the country, etc.  And I've been reading non-law books, such as Jung and my art books, several of which I bought out here at a used book store.

I'm living with 2 non-law students and that is working out quite well.  Neither of them is going to school, they both work.

My courses are 75% good.  I have one dud course, but Bob Padia and I alternate attending class and I only have to face that once a week.  My 3 other classes are really fine, the material is interesting and the teachers are all eminently knowledgeable and quite effective as teachers.  It was one of these courses, Psychoanalytical Jurisprudence, that was the motivating factor that got me started in Jung. (see earlier comment on inertia)  I have a fairly light credit load and I'm staying away from such traditional law courses as Tax and Estates and Trusts.  My interests certainly do not lie in those areas and what little help they would be to me is outweighed by the dullness of the material and the effort required to maintain in the classes.

I just got back from a performance of the Cleveland Quartet, a group that succeeded the Budapest Quartet as artists in residence at SUNY at Buffalo in 1971.  Have you ever heard of them?  I didn't until just recently.  The performance was excellent, they did some traditional pieces by Haydn and Beethoven and also some more unusual compositions by Ives and Slonimsky.

Cal has an excellent selection of musical events on campus which I took advantage of last year and will do so again this year.

I got food stamps this week that along with a $600 grant, a $1,500 loan and my California residency should allow me to manage the experience this year.  However, I appear almost certain that I must find a job for next summer.

I'll close now; write. soon.