My breathing is heavy and my skin drenched, slicked by a layer of perspiration. I’m scared. There’s no denying this fear. You should feel it, too. After all, this is finals week. And I’m betting there are a million places you’d rather be than where you are right now.
Sitting in class has felt more like being strapped into an electric chair these past several weeks. Since the Martin Luther King holiday, we’ve operated with the solemn knowledge that it would be another two months before a vacation possibility came our way. And as this day came closer, the days got longer.
But we’re here now. Just in time, too. My attitude toward school might best be described as apathetic. Sure, I had two projects due week 10 in lieu of any final exams, so technically speaking I’m home free for the term. But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel a fair share of rueful indignation over my being here at all.
Depending on what year of school you’re in, how much intellectual stimulation (or lack thereof) you receive and on how well you respond to social situations, you’ve got to empathize. At least a little. It’s frustrating to sit through classes you don’t feel are worth your time. But the days continue to grow longer, and as President Frohnmayer prepares to release us to our week of freedom, we face the realization that this short time ahead of us is ours, and ours only to do with as we please. So why aren’t I more excited?
When you’re a freshman, spring break is awesome. The possibilities seem limitless: You can take a road trip to British Columbia, where the 19-year-old legal drinking limit is just waiting to be taken advantage of. Or you can return to your hometown, and quietly judge the popular kids from your high school graduating class who are struggling to realize the things that make them cool when they were 17 – a hand-me-down Nissan from the ’80s, an older sibling to buy beer, facial hair – don’t make them so cool anymore.
Sophomore year is more complicated. With the novelty of the college experience long worn off, realizing you’re not even halfway home might make you feel like crying and/or burning things. I can’t speak for anyone other than myself, but in retrospect I’ll say I would have saved myself a great deal of emotional stress by using that break to talk with a therapist.
I can only guess what sort of frustrations are in store for senior year. But if it’s anything like how I feel now there’s going to be a whole heaping pile of resentment. My point is that, by now, you’ve spent a good two-thirds of your life trapped in a cycle of deference. You give teachers your time and attention and respect them, if only because the quicker you do so the less turbulent your time there will be. If school were a business and we students were the workers, I doubt we’d be allowed to form a union. And if we did it’d be a dangerous thing, because my demands would include a shorter workweek, abolishing gen-eds and creating a new type of academic probation for teachers whose overall ratings fall below 2.5 on ratemyprofessor.com.
In the end, though, nothing good comes out of trying to force these things to pass. Especially when you know exactly what you signed up for, and you can get out any time you want. But who wants to be a college dropout? For those of us without budding careers in hip-hop, it’s best to just hang on for the ride. And that’s why spring break is something to be thankful for.
[email protected]