Taking Stock of Tomorrow

Nearly halfway through the semester, I want to stop and look back on the time that passed in the blink of an eye that got me to this point. Made it to the middle; I'm at rock bottom and it's an uphill climb to the top at the end. This could be the worst. My life these days is fused to the clock, so even if I want to stop and look back, time pushes me forward.

Despite my hectic schedule, I'm usually good about remembering things. Apparently this year is different. Pre-enrollment for spring courses begins on Monday for me. Wow. It crept up on me. Where was my head? I usually sort through classes weeks in advance of pre-enrollment just to distract myself from the present stress and to indulge in a little fantasy (which never seems to come true) of how next semester's courses will be easier and more manageable. A few days ago I picked up the course packet for the Spring and there were hardly any left over. Apparently I really have been in a bubble since everyone else knew.

This weekend: pick classes.

But this weekend is particularly insane. My two jobs both need me so I'll be putting in a couple of hours of work on Saturday and Sunday. How many times have I said, "no rest of the weary?"

And if this weekend seems unusually tough, it's only foreboding probably the toughest month ahead of me. November, bring it on, but I'm not saying I got the energy to deal with you. I was spoiled in October since circumstances enabled me to take off an extra day of work every week. That hiatus is over and November's back to full schedule with a vengeance--5 days of work a week. I haven't been able to keep up with my school work on 4 days of work a week, so I'm a little bit worried about 5.

As time inevitably drags me closer to the end of this year (I no longer even have the strength to drag my feet through the mud), I still don't know for sure whether or not I'll be graduating. I put in my application, but my advisor is holding me up. For the past two weeks he's told me how he hasn't been able to fill out my application to graduate, and then he self-indulgently smiles and says, "don't worry, we'll get you out of here." If he only knew what kind of torture this is for me.

Two weeks, baby; I've been on his case for two weeks and he tells me these horror stories of people who almost weren't let out because of that damn application and I wonder why can't he just get the paperwork rolling?!? In the meantime, because of this, I have no clue what I'm doing come May. Gearing up for another year of academic prison or trying to figure out my life for real? I'm really chill about the whole thing. See, I've stopped caring, but campus life is a ridiculous constant reminder. Every day I get a barrage of deadlines for applications, internships, grad school visits that I pass up because I have no clue what's even worth looking into. Whatever, I don't even have the time.

It'll all start to let up around Thanksgiving. I decided to take an extra couple days off of school to fly home early. Heck yeah. The thing is, I had the worst nightmare last night--that I missed my flight out of here for Thanksgiving so I ended up being stuck on the deserted campus for the whole holiday--I almost went insane. I get shivers just thinking about it. Waking up to that dream just heightens my anticipation for that break, hurry on up!

Lambs, I'm just happy I have an extra hour to count some sheep this weekend.