The end is in sight

A week ago, many of us were showing our thanks for what we have by gorging ourselves.

We feasted, took family pictures and for those of us of legal drinking age (or with “cool” parents), we discovered how awkward it is to get tipsy with our aunt’s second husband.
But that’s all history, and now begins what they call “the most wonderful time of the year.”

Finally, we can stop being humble, and we can start telling family members what they should buy us for the holidays.

As a college student, it’s difficult to agree it’s the most wonderful time of the year.
Coming back to classes Monday is one of the most disheartening experiences of the fall semester. Every single class has some sort of project, presentation or paper due before finals, and you didn’t do any of the work you planned to do during break.

Perhaps worst of all, it is at this point the social aspect of college life goes completely out the window. Well, not entirely — you still have this coming weekend to go crazy with all your friends and acquaintances.

After that, everyone will be hit with the same realization, “Oh yeah, I’m here to learn.”
Suddenly, blowing off all that reading the entire semester isn’t as funny as it was a month ago when you were bragging to your friends about it.

There is one silver lining I can point to, and that is with all this school work, it is much easier to avoid all the awkward people you’ve met this past semester. They text you asking what you’re doing every weekend. They’re not bad people, but having a non-contributor tagging along is the worst.

Now when you get that text, you don’t have to lie. Just be careful when they want to study with you. They might not talk at all in social situations, but when you’re all alone, you can’t shut them up.

Don’t worry about them next semester. They’ll find someone new to latch onto, or maybe they’ll become a millionaire, and you’ll be left pondering what could have been. At least that’s what I always assume happens to people I avoid.

But while all these things are true, these next two weeks will be over before you know it. The days go by faster and faster as finals get closer.

It might be because of the workload and the stress or because seeing the sun is an event worthy of a Facebook status.  Either way, soon enough we’ll all be studying a textbook for our last final as we rationalize calling it an early night. We’ll definitely try harder next semester. Maybe.

­— agreiner@indiana.edu