This is what I have been waiting for all along. I had yet to feel that familiar academic panic that accompanied every finals season in undergrad and I met hubris for my lack of effort and concern over classes. Every semester culminated with a week spent in the library poring over books and outlines crafted from half assed notes jotted down on the sometimes rare occasion that I made it to class. This term was a little different at least. I attended almost every class and only missed for legitimate reasons. I have had such a terribly difficult time getting back into the necessary mindset for writing academic papers. But here I am. 2:45 in the morning on the last week of class; caffeine ripping through my body like heroin and wide awake with work in the morning. I remember those days from undergrad when I would shamble from class to class and final to final after not sleeping for 40+ hours just counting down until I was done. I remember that I started the idiotic and sometimes almost disastrous practice of being good all week during finals only to go out with a vengeance the night before my last Croft final. Why? I honestly have no idea. I can say that I never bombed that last Croft final though in all of my years of slacking at Ole Miss. The last one, even through a semi-intoxicated haze in the aftermath of capping the semester off in a blaze of glory, was never as difficult as the first one. The first one was the one I really had to buckle down for.
Allow me to be frank. There is a perfectly normal reason for my not posting in two months. Assuredly, it was not because there was nothing of note to report. Oh no. There was plenty. The problem was one that I never anticipated. Writer’s block. In the worst kind of way. I was too busy thinking about how the hell I was going to write end of term papers that I forgot a key component of good writing; sometimes you simply have to get things off your chest. Just write. It doesn’t matter if it’s good or uses great syntax or clever euphemisms. Just put it out there. The quickest way to knock something loose is to go throw everything you’ve got down and see how it all lays out.
This first semester in grad school was a struggle. Maybe for those of you who have already had your first term back in school know what I am talking about. It sucks. It’s different. I feel like I have regressed in general intelligence, although I have this awful suspicion that I simply am not as bright as I would like to give myself credit for.
Strange memories this nervous night in our nation’s capitol. I remember those nights in the library or the honor’s college on campus. The honor’s college always seemed to be absolutely freezing and was never the most comfortable place to study, but at least it was open 24 hours. Those long outlines used for Croft finals and going over them time and again, all in search of that big picture idea to convey back to the professors that spent the semester trying to pry into our heads between all the malted hops and bong resin. I remember working through the night and getting to that stage where being awake isn’t really applicable any more, but rather just being. I remember staying up all night working on a project, heading out to help judge a JROTC field meet, then immediately heading to Memphis for a Jay-Z concert. As if that wasn’t enough after going sleepless for 40 hours, my drunk ass friends needed a driver and decided to stay at a house party until dawn. All of this was capped off by throwing a football with friends as the sun came up over Huntington Place, still unsure of what exactly had happened over the last 46 hours, but nevertheless strangely excited and altogether proud that I had been awake for that entire time.
I feel like it’s a new dawn and a new day. I promise to blog more. The music is slowing down.
Live triumphantly.