It's that time of year again: the late days of spring where a noncommittal heat mingles with tree pollen and stiff breezes blow through impossibly thick stacks of paper as students hurry from class to class. It's the final weeks of yet another school year, filled with all the seemingly endless tests and essays and projects all due at the same time. And of course, all the students wander glassy-eyed through the halls, completely blindsided by the month of May.
Realistically, this shouldn't all come as a surprise every year. We all know that finals season is annual, that the same thing happens year. We're certainly aware that May follows April follows March and so forth. We all have calendars counting down the days to each assessment and due date. We know this happens, yet somehow every year we are left lost and confused by the fact that time passes and due dates arrive.
Why do we do this? Why are we inexplicably incapable of truly comprehending the speed of a schedule? Surely, we can responsibly budget time for a busy stretch. Not so, evidently.
Perhaps it's not a failing at all or at least not in the way it seems to be. Up until that final month or so, the schedule falls at a roughly steady rate. It only hits its incessant pace in the few weeks before finals begin. There is no real way to adjust to the speed of time when it has merely slipped by effortlessly for an entire year. Furthermore, we know what's coming. We really do. If we know the worst is coming, why not put it off?
