In spite of what movies have tried to tell me over the years, spring break doesn’t really feel like some reckless adventure at the end of which I somehow learn that the only real way to be cool is to have friends who care about you or something (I never watch all the way through). Instead it’s more of a war of attrition between the part of me that knows I should be doing homework and the part of me that really wants to watch one more episode of House of Cards. Though whether you’re out there carpe diem-ing or binge-watching Netflix, I suspect break still ends the same way for everyone: With an intense feeling of panic as you realize that you haven’t done any of the stuff you told yourself you would and that you have six midterms and a paper due next week (don’t know who thought that was a good idea). Or maybe that experience is unique to me. In that case please excuse me because I have some crying I need to do.
Spring break has been a much-needed and extremely helpful break for me. I don’t know about other people but by the time it rolled around I was just about ready for a vacation.
Something about the never-ending rain of stress that is midterm season at Hopkins had me ready for a solid week where I only woke up to eat and catch the end of a Gilmore Girls rerun.
I know my mother has a few things to say about how I’ve chosen to spend my precious time off. Mostly “Have you moved yet today?” or “When was the last time you showered?” (Mothers, am I right?) But at the end of the day taking the time to do nothing is an important part of staying sane. Though every friend of my parents has insisted on reminding me that “College is going to be the easiest time of your life,” it is an extraordinarily stressful experience (which I suppose doesn’t bode well for my future). I think the biggest factor is that you never really get a day off. However if you have a job you are going to have days where you won’t need to go into work or have vacation time which you can take off. Students don’t get that flexibility.
I am very rarely able to sit back and relax on a weekend, comfortable knowing that I have nothing to do. No, when I watch Netflix I am not simply rewarding myself for completing homework or finishing an essay. I am dancing with the devil as I attempt to set the record for how little sleep a person can function on before a midterm (which is hard because my current record is none).
As students we don’t get time off. If I’m not doing work then I’m certainly thinking about all the work I should be doing. If I decide to be lazy then I am plagued by the ghosts of all the things I could have accomplished instead of Googling cat pictures for an hour. This break is finally a chance to lean back and do absolutely nothing and to feel no shame as I am audibly overwhelmed by the fluffy cuteness of internet kittens. We all deserve a break every once in a while even if we use it for nothing more productive than increasing Netflix’s profit margins. Now if only I could get my mother to understand this, I would never have to leave the couch again.
