Maggie Ondrey ’25
Frequent Library Studier
Cast:
You (you)
Your friend (insert your friend’s name)
Your afternoon class is over, two forty-five, you’re strolling back from your classroom. Maybe it’s Seabury, maybe it’s McCook. You bought a planner this year, in hopes of your academic journey progressing upward. While you’re in this class, (we’re backpedaling now) you took the class time of a lecture to actually just write down your assignments for this week which honestly feels super good, who knew it was this easy?! After you write these assignments down and you’re pushing that silver rectangle that makes those doors feel so heavy, you’re out of class and heading to your dorm (readers, we are back to where we started). You maybe have headphones on (let’s assume, for the sake of the plot, you are wearing headphones) listening to the Cranberries. It’s so fall and so college, maybe you’ll get asked what you’re listening to (you won’t). It’s a Wednesday, maybe you’ve been brought back to those times in middle school where boys with Reeboks and neon “performance legging” would screech “HUMP DAY” against the shrill of seafoam gray lockers. Maybe you’re not, but either way, it is fine because it is Wednesday which to you (please, reader, for the sake of the plot, assume this applies) means that you have so many assignments due tonight and for the rest of the end of the week (ugh, but at least they look so nice in your planner). Text your friend (insert friend’s name) and say “Library tonight * insert the eyes emoji. *” It’s three by now (you’re a scenic walker and that chapel looked so photogenic in that prime afternoon light!) Back in your room, and man, you are tired, but your friend has texted you back “I really don’t want to but I know I should,” you’ve got them! This is great, solidarity in suffering gives you some hope!
You’re in your bed, a little nap to get your brain rested for the library, right? Yes please! (reader, this is going to make you so much more tired and you’re going to regret it)! Okay, so you wake up around five-thirty, oops (you set your alarm for thirty minutes) and you grab dinner with your friend and your dazzling plate of gold fuels you up for the library (your plate consists of buttered noodles) and you two discuss matters of how your day was and how much you have to get done and maybe that one person in your class that mouth breathes. You’re off to the library which is exciting (it’s actually dreadful but tell yourself it’s exciting) and you two spend over twenty minutes trying to find a table, the air is heavy in there and the more you move the more you sweat. It’s humbling having to pass the same people who are at tables as you search corner to corner for a spot that doesn’t have one person sitting at a five person table (you are enraged over this). You settle for the back tables that sit on the awning over the reading room and sprawl out. Now you connect your headphones to your computer and pull up the first assignment (I will not assume your major so insert assignment here) and you then open Spotify and look up the word “Studying” and decide to take a chance on a curated study playlist for you (if you use Apple Music, I’m sorry this part of the story is not for you). This playlist honestly sucks but you manage to finish your first assignment and you turn to your friend who has actually taken the time to go through their emails and say you need a walkabout. Obviously, you deserve it and you decide you also deserve a Peter B’s cookie as well. You tell your friend you will split it which is good because it sucks the moisture from your mouth, so you don’t have to deal with it alone. Now you stumble back upstairs, the journey to Peter B’s is concluded which is disappointing because now you don’t have anything to look forward to. Back at your butt aching wooden chair you decide maybe you should study for that exam on Friday, you decide that the best course of action is to make a study guide that you focus way too much time on the alignment on your bullet points (this is a handwritten study guide). You’re feeling good, your friend is actually doing their work too now and all is well. You feel like you’re balancing on the line of what it feels like to get your work done without procrastination; annoying but worth it. Maybe you should never stop doing this? (you will proceed to procrastinate all weekend). Okay, so, your friend texts you when they’re sitting right across from you and asks what time you’re leaving, check the clock and it’s 10:45, wow! You’ve been working for so long (you have taken many breaks and actually taken the time to learn your friend’s art history assignment). So, then you look up at them and give them the eyes, the eyes of if you wanna go I’ll go, and they raise their eyebrows at you in a mirroring of comedic relief. In your mind you two are bankers closing a deal and you reach across the table to shake hands (your friend would never do this; they have very sweaty hands). The night has come to an end and your time at the library is over and you should feel proud of yourself (that is what you tell yourself).
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