Prologue: Hopeful Innocence
It's the beginning of the month of January. You're starting to miss your college friends, and your siblings are starting to drive you up the wall. And you know what else is driving you up the wall? The weather. For days, you curse whichever near or distant relative decided to move your family to such an abhorrent climate. You really can't stand being cold. But you are. Very cold.
Other than that, though, you're excited for the new semester. You're determined to nail it - attending all of your classes, not procrastinating, and getting good grades. This is your chance. And you are confident that you can do it.
You're ready to get going on what is going to be the most successful semester yet.
Chapter 1: Syllabus Week
By far the most popular week of the entire semester, Syllabus Week holds a special place in your heart. Class is best-part optional, and nothing of substance is taught. And if it is, well, you're probably not the only one who missed it, so...
Chapter 2: Every Other Week
After that, everything just starts going downhill. Professors actually expect you to start doing things, and you know deep down that you should be taking notes.
Chapter 3: Peer Pressure
When you were in elementary school, they lectured you endlessly on the importance of not caving to peer pressure. At the time, you thought it was stupid. Surely you weren't going to do cocaine just because some other idiot wanted you to. What they didn't warn you about was how you would feel when you needed to do work but all of your friends were going out.
Spoiler alert: You're going to go out, too.
Chapter 4: Frat Basements
Everyone knows that the college stories that you're going to remember are the ones set in frat basements...if you can remember them the next morning.
Chapter 5: The Morning After
No words necessary to explain the feeling of death after a long night of drinking.
Chapter 6: College in a Nutshell
After your little adventure, it's time to get back to work. You have so much work to do. So, naturally, you follow the motto adopted by college students everywhere.
Chapter 7: Stress Eating
Despite the fact that you swore to yourself that you were going to get healthy and lose weight this semester, you're stressed enough that any kind of unhealthy food sounds good to you. You know that you're going to feel like crap afterward, but, like, food. You really have no choice. So you eat your bodyweight in any and every type of food.
Italian...
McDonald's
Domino's
Chinese food...
Tacos...
The list is endless. Eventually, you slip into a food coma, during which you dream that you are a slice of pizza running around trying to escape the weight of the food baby that you've conceived.
Chapter 8: An Alternate Coping Strategy
In addition to curling up in bed and sleeping for seven years or devouring an entire dozen donuts single-handedly, college students love to avoid their problems. Whether it be skipping class, skipping an assignment, or simply skipping around campus instead of studying, college students are great at ignoring important tasks and opting for the path-of-least-resistance.
And you are no exception.
Chapter 9: Misery Loves Company
At some point during the semester - and most likely at many points during the semester - you will take great solace in the suffering of your fellow classmates. While this sounds twisted, it is entirely true - the fact that everyone is dying makes you feel significantly better about your own troubles. Luckily, this is a common phenomenon, so you can very easily satiate your thirst for non-personal pain by simply complaining to a friend about how hard your life is. They are literally guaranteed to give you a nice little dose of their own strife in return. And now, you are both able to bask in each other's empathy and strengthen your relationship by emphasizing your bond as fellow college students.
Chapter 10: Misery hates happiness.
Of course, in addition to the majority of college students, who are enduring the pain alongside you, there is bound to be that kid who has it all figured out and is happily sleeping with an A already in possession while you are straining to reach that C-. You hate these kinds of people. How dare they be happy? How dare it be so easy for them? You idly think about how hypocritical you are, considering you were one of them in high school, but your passive musing is nothing compared to your active hatred. Suffer, damnit!!!
Chapter 11: Insomnia
It is now the night before a major midterm. You have worked hard getting all of your studying done - ok, or at least you opened the textbook once - and you are ready to go to sleep. You want to get a solid 8 hours before the exam - you've tried taking exams while battling exhaustion, and it wasn't pretty. Unfortunately for you, your brain (and whatever other sleep gods control our circadian rhythm) has decided that tonight, you aren't getting any sleep. You lie in bed for hours, getting more and more agitated as the night wears on.
This is probably one of the top five worst feelings, after period cramps and getting your chest hairs plucked out one by one.
Chapter 12: The Morning After Reprise
Caffeine. And lots of it.
Chapter 13: The Test
Chapter 14: The Life-Saving "Cheat Sheet"
Everyone knows the excitement of being allowed a page of notes for the exam.
Chapter 15: The *Blank "Cheat Sheet"
What is less exciting is that moment when you realize that said page of notes is going to be entirely useless because you have no idea what is going on and can't even understand the material well enough to make a coherent attempt at taking notes.
Chapter 16: Defense
Ultimately, when you get your exams back, you have to face the reality of the 97 - out of 500 points - that you got on the exam. At first, it's hilarious. You crack jokes about your stupidity, some of which undoubtedly involve living in a cardboard box.
Chapter 17: Bombshell
And then reality hits...
Your roommates get pissed that you're flooding the apartment, but you're too upset to care.
Chapter 18: Self-Hatred
And then, once your body is entirely out of water and your cheeks are so tear-stained that you can salt your fries with them, you begin to despise yourself. You're stupid and dumb and worthless and a generally shitty human being.
(P.S. None of what you're saying to yourself is actually true.)
Chapter 19: Submission
Ultimately, you just have to get over it.
Moving on. Better luck next time. The end. (This is a very time-consuming and strenuous process.)
Chapter 20: Course Evaluations
Course evaluations mark the best class of the semester. Not only is the professor required to stop lecturing at you early in order to accommodate, but you also now have the opportunity to voice your real opinions. You almost feel bad for the professors. Students can be really harsh.
Chapter 21: Reflection
Approaching finals is one of the best times for deep reflection. You feel the need to calculate the minimum score that you need on each exam in order to get the final grades that you want, and this makes you realize just how much you screwed up. This leads to much moping, further delaying the studying process.
Chapter 22: Finals
Chapter 23: "Time's up!"
Just before the clock runs out, you throw down your pencil and hand in your exam. As you grab your backpack and leave the room, your professor says, "Time's up!" and you don't think two words have ever made you this happy.
Epilogue: The Storm Clouds Disperse
Forget internships. I'm going to Hawaii.
College, man...
