"You have four years to be irresponsible here. Relax. Work is for people with jobs. You'll never remember class time, but you'll remember time you wasted hanging out with your friends. So, stay out late. Go out on a Tuesday with your friends when you have a paper due Wednesday. Spend money you don't have. Drink 'til sunrise. The work never ends, but college does."
Tonight, I took his advice.
I'm a notorious procrastinator when it comes to schoolwork. I wait to do everything until the last possible second, and every time I say to myself "If I would just start on this earlier, I'd be better off." You'd think I would've learned by now, but you'd be wrong.
The paper due for my World Lit II class in less than 13 hours has been no different. I've known about the paper since the beginning of the semester and the topics have been posted for about 2-3 weeks now. Naturally, I waited until this past week to even look at the topics, then bs'd my way through the mandatory student-professor conference to discuss my paper, and now I'm sitting here writing this blog at 1 a.m. instead of writing the paper. So what's the point?
Well I spent most of the day today at work. Most of the time my priorities are really messed up and I feel like my job (which I absolutely love) is my number one responsibility when I know that I really should focus on school first. That said, I worked a volleyball match today at 1 and then left and went straight to soccer where I stood for a good 2 hours in the rain and watched as our team desperately fought to find a way to win and then sadly lost in the final minutes. I returned home soaking wet, really cold, and not at all ready to write a paper. After placing an order with Pizza Hut, I stood in a steaming hot shower for about 15 minutes and slowly climbed out to towel off and face, what I thought at the time was, the inevitable. Alas, it was not so. I went in the living room to find that a Law & Order: SVU marathon was on. I knew this meant trouble. It was approximately 7:00. Next thing I knew, it was 10:00 and I'd been watching Elliot and Olivia catch the bad guys for a little over three hours. My roommates both had tests to study for as well, and were equally convinced that as soon as the marathon was over we were all going to go about our business and get our acts together and study. As "Executive Producer: Dick Wolf" scrolled across the screen to the sounds of the closing "Duh duh duh duh dummmmm..." no one moved. We all looked at each other as if to say "Do we have to?" the way a five-year-old does when his mom tells him it's time for bed. Laura finally broke the silence and seemingly-jokingly asked "So what's on next?" We laughed, but I had happened to see that The Bourne Ultimatum was about to start so I piped up. Laura's next words were "So who wants to watch this and then pull an all-nighter?"
Three hands went up in the air, popcorn was made, and we retired back to our most-uncomfortable couch for another few hours of laziness.
Now, I realize this all seems pretty innocent. It isn't scandalous or thrilling, and nothing about it is original or revolutionary. But then I think back to Tom Petty's quote.
I just spent about six hours with two of my best friends. We laughed at each other's corny jokes, we talked about how hot Matt Damon was, about the weather this week, about how much we didn't want to study. It was relaxing, it was fun, and it was care-free. And for every minute that I spend worrying about school or work or how I'm going to balance the two, I need at least five minutes of fun, relaxing, and care-free time to remind me that there are more important things in life.
So yes, I'm going to be up pretty late tonight. And no, this probably won't be the best paper I've ever written. But as cheesy as it might be, five years from now I won't be able to tell you what this paper was about, but I'll damn sure be able to tell you about how much fun I had with my best friends watching TV and laughing and enjoying each other's company. And at the end of the day, isn't that what we really want to remember anyway?
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