Imagine this: it’s a Friday morning, the weekend’s here, you only have a few classes to get through, and then you're home free. You can hang out with friends, watch some television, catch up on all those Netflix shows you’ve been meaning to watch (specifically "Luke Cage" and "Stranger Things"), and maybe you’ll even cram in some schoolwork here and there. The weekend is every college kids goal at the end of the week, the gold at the end of the rainbow, the buried treasure buried on a deserted island, the slight reprieve we get from a busy workweek and, unless you work weekends, is the only reprieve you get when vacation days and snow days are taken out of the equation. Unfortunately, you’ve just realized you were hit with some slight food poisoning due to the leftovers you had last night, or perhaps that one burger you had for lunch put you over the edge. Either way, you’re sick, and while you aren’t going to class anytime soon, you aren’t doing much anytime soon except for writing in pain and praying for the end.

While that might seem a bit melodramatic, that was more or less my Friday afternoon, and while I was only slightly happy I missed my classes, I would honestly rather go to both classes I had on Friday seven times over then have a minor stomach bug of any variety. I was actually looking forward to relaxing on my birthday weekend (Happy Birthday to me, here’s some food poisoning) and getting some school work finished that I oh-so desperately needed done, all of that was brought to a grinding halt because of some minor food poisoning. I understand that being sick is a part of life, and something like that is out of my control, but COME ON, could the universe pick a SLIGHTLY better time for me to get sick, like when I don’t have a million projects due in three weeks or something. Either way, as of the time of this writing, I’m doing much better, and while my school work situation hasn’t exactly gotten better, I can say that my physical health is much better than it was on Friday.

The universe can sometimes hit you with a little bit of good luck, and sometimes a little bit of bad, and in my case, it was long overdue bad luck that I was hit with. In the long run, I turned out okay, it wasn’t some death illness that put me in a hospital, and now I can return to my beloved schoolwork (he typed with a hint of sarcasm), so why am I so fixated on being ill? Maybe because it interfered with my leisure time, leisure time that I rarely get because I work on the weekends, and decided to take this weekend, my birthday weekend, off. Maybe because I’d rather spend my time hanging out with friends, reading some comics, and whatnot rather than writing in pain and feeling woozy. Maybe I have a flair for the dramatic, and like to complain about the facts of life. Or perhaps there’s some grand, cosmic conspiracy against me and having the one thing I desire more than anything in this lifetime. Not money or power, but precious leisure time; time to do whatever I want when I want. I suppose with the former two I could have all of the leisure time in the word, but I digress.

Being a college student, as many of you know, is a serious and studious environment, with plenty of hardships, as well as moments of satisfaction when a project you worked on for a while comes together nicely. So when a little leisure time strolls along, amid your chaotic work schedule, you hold onto it and never let go. Letting it slip away because you’re ill or incapacitated is pretty annoying. That said, there were some benefits in all of this situation. I did get to miss two classes I wasn’t overly thrilled about attending that day, and I did have a valid excuse for not being productive this weekend. Of course it was at the most inopportune time, but it beats “Uh, I got lazy” as an excuse. I suppose there’s a bit of a silver lining in every story. Now if I could find one for procrastinating on other things I have to do, I’ll let you all know.