A Narrative About My Experience with a Series of All-nighters
Somewhere along the line you start to wonder exactly how it happened. How did you go from staying up as late as you wanted in order to watch Youtube videos to pass the time, to this? Staying up as late as you possibly can, because you have to finish that paper that you put off over the weekend. But you've got a full day ahead of you when the morning comes, and you'd really like a get a couple of hours of sleep before facing it all.
Only you know that when you sleep, if you sleep, you'll just crawl out of bed and not have time to eat breakfast (not like you have time to, anyway, that lecture is ten minutes away from your dorm, and you wake up fifteen minutes beforehand, barely giving you time to find the right socks and decent pants) and of course, that paper won't finish itself and hand itself in.
But at this point, with about three pages to go, you just want to fuck it all and hand it in; might as well just accept the grade that you're bound to get. Just hand it in and leave before the lecture begins, it can’t hurt to miss one class-that’s one extra hour of sleep, after all.
Never mind the times you lay in bed after the alarm went off, when the sun hit you in the eye because the blinds are crap and it takes forever to close them, and you decided you could afford to miss that lecture because you’ll do that reading (even though you never did before) and one hour really makes all the difference.
Never mind finals are only a week away and you’re scared shitless because really, you’re just a first semester freshman and the semester isn’t going at all the way you expected.
But you know after this, you’re not close to finished, because there’s that oral presentation you have later that afternoon, right before that experiment you need to show up before you get negative credit. And just when you think you could get a couple of hours in for a nap before dinner, you have to meet with that group about something-or-other and it’s hazy and at this hour, completely unimportant; but you know you have to do it anyway because it’s written on your hand and didn’t wash off in the shower because you held that hand up to the wall to hold you up as you tried to wake up in the cold water-because you were too groggy from falling asleep over your textbook only moments before to remember to turn the water all the way to hot.
And really, it’s your fault, because you could have managed your time better and slept some, and you really should have put some diligence into your work before now, because these final grades might not make or break you the way you expected-but really, none of it makes sense at this hour, and all you want right now is for your paper to finish itself and be magically perfect.
But really, it is so far from being perfect, your thesis statement is too broad, you need more evidence to drag on the paper for another 3 pages, and your citations are all screwed up. Whoever designed footnotes, and MLA, and Chicago-style, deserves to burn in a firey pit of burning shit, you decide.
You shouldn’t be complaining, and you know you should stop and just turn back to that paper and get it done as soon as you can-but your focus is completely gone. You’ve been living with three hours of sleep a night at best and your mind is so shot that you can’t hear the music coming out of your earphones. Your sheets are falling off the mattress, allowing you to see the clear stripes on the mattress from where you shuffled back and forth, trying to make sense of what you were reading.
(You wouldn’t need to go back and fix your sheets later if you were working at your desk, perhaps, but anyone who has sat in chairs like that know that they’re uncomfortable for five hours straight, much less a whole night. Besides, yours is filled with clothes you didn’t have time to put away-clothes, which reminds you that laundry day’s coming up, which is going to be hell, because there never are washing machines free unless you sit by one, obstinately, for an hour. And even then, there’s never a conveniently free dryer right after your clothes are washed and thank goodness there’s no mildew on your clothes.)
You feel a little bad about complaining, because you know that a lot of people have it worse-your engineering friend at RPI hasn’t slept for more than an hour a day, and has three exams in one day this week. You know this, but you still feel annoyed, especially when you look at your buddy list (because, of course you’re still signed on, even if you’re away) and see that the majority of the people are sleeping.
Inhale. Exhale. You try to clear your head, but your stomach’s growling because it hasn’t eaten in nine hours-you could conceivably heat something up, you wonder. You have one packet of EasyMac left, and that box of Cocoa Puffs is right by your bed, sans milk. But then you look over and see your sleeping roommate who is tossing and turning because of your heavy typing, and you don’t want to wake her up with the microwave of the plastic in the cereal box.
So you tell your stomach to fuck off, to which it only growls louder.
You wonder exactly when, during this whole time, you signed a contract giving your soul up to the Devil, because it certainly feels like that, since all you can think about is just sleeping and getting that rest.
It’s not so bad, you know, and most of the time, it’s pretty fucking awesome. You love it, and you’re not aching to go back home to your house, rules, and restrictions. You’re on your own and it’s more than fun, it’s amazing, and you’ve come to care about your makeshift family up here.
But sometimes, somewhere along the line, you just stare up at your ceiling (that you were talking to the other day, when you couldn’t sleep; you know, that day you had no work?) and wonder exactly how it all happened.
Only you know that when you sleep, if you sleep, you'll just crawl out of bed and not have time to eat breakfast (not like you have time to, anyway, that lecture is ten minutes away from your dorm, and you wake up fifteen minutes beforehand, barely giving you time to find the right socks and decent pants) and of course, that paper won't finish itself and hand itself in.
But at this point, with about three pages to go, you just want to fuck it all and hand it in; might as well just accept the grade that you're bound to get. Just hand it in and leave before the lecture begins, it can’t hurt to miss one class-that’s one extra hour of sleep, after all.
Never mind the times you lay in bed after the alarm went off, when the sun hit you in the eye because the blinds are crap and it takes forever to close them, and you decided you could afford to miss that lecture because you’ll do that reading (even though you never did before) and one hour really makes all the difference.
Never mind finals are only a week away and you’re scared shitless because really, you’re just a first semester freshman and the semester isn’t going at all the way you expected.
But you know after this, you’re not close to finished, because there’s that oral presentation you have later that afternoon, right before that experiment you need to show up before you get negative credit. And just when you think you could get a couple of hours in for a nap before dinner, you have to meet with that group about something-or-other and it’s hazy and at this hour, completely unimportant; but you know you have to do it anyway because it’s written on your hand and didn’t wash off in the shower because you held that hand up to the wall to hold you up as you tried to wake up in the cold water-because you were too groggy from falling asleep over your textbook only moments before to remember to turn the water all the way to hot.
And really, it’s your fault, because you could have managed your time better and slept some, and you really should have put some diligence into your work before now, because these final grades might not make or break you the way you expected-but really, none of it makes sense at this hour, and all you want right now is for your paper to finish itself and be magically perfect.
But really, it is so far from being perfect, your thesis statement is too broad, you need more evidence to drag on the paper for another 3 pages, and your citations are all screwed up. Whoever designed footnotes, and MLA, and Chicago-style, deserves to burn in a firey pit of burning shit, you decide.
You shouldn’t be complaining, and you know you should stop and just turn back to that paper and get it done as soon as you can-but your focus is completely gone. You’ve been living with three hours of sleep a night at best and your mind is so shot that you can’t hear the music coming out of your earphones. Your sheets are falling off the mattress, allowing you to see the clear stripes on the mattress from where you shuffled back and forth, trying to make sense of what you were reading.
(You wouldn’t need to go back and fix your sheets later if you were working at your desk, perhaps, but anyone who has sat in chairs like that know that they’re uncomfortable for five hours straight, much less a whole night. Besides, yours is filled with clothes you didn’t have time to put away-clothes, which reminds you that laundry day’s coming up, which is going to be hell, because there never are washing machines free unless you sit by one, obstinately, for an hour. And even then, there’s never a conveniently free dryer right after your clothes are washed and thank goodness there’s no mildew on your clothes.)
You feel a little bad about complaining, because you know that a lot of people have it worse-your engineering friend at RPI hasn’t slept for more than an hour a day, and has three exams in one day this week. You know this, but you still feel annoyed, especially when you look at your buddy list (because, of course you’re still signed on, even if you’re away) and see that the majority of the people are sleeping.
Inhale. Exhale. You try to clear your head, but your stomach’s growling because it hasn’t eaten in nine hours-you could conceivably heat something up, you wonder. You have one packet of EasyMac left, and that box of Cocoa Puffs is right by your bed, sans milk. But then you look over and see your sleeping roommate who is tossing and turning because of your heavy typing, and you don’t want to wake her up with the microwave of the plastic in the cereal box.
So you tell your stomach to fuck off, to which it only growls louder.
You wonder exactly when, during this whole time, you signed a contract giving your soul up to the Devil, because it certainly feels like that, since all you can think about is just sleeping and getting that rest.
It’s not so bad, you know, and most of the time, it’s pretty fucking awesome. You love it, and you’re not aching to go back home to your house, rules, and restrictions. You’re on your own and it’s more than fun, it’s amazing, and you’ve come to care about your makeshift family up here.
But sometimes, somewhere along the line, you just stare up at your ceiling (that you were talking to the other day, when you couldn’t sleep; you know, that day you had no work?) and wonder exactly how it all happened.