It’s time to get down to business. You head straight to O’Neill, diving head first into what you know will be an all-nighter. You wonder, as you walk up to the purely concrete building, Didn’t I promise myself I wouldn’t let it get this far again?
As you ponder the true character of your work ethic, you prowl the floors of O’Neill searching for the perfect spot for the next twelve hours of pure misery. In an attempt to make a positive stride toward success, you decide to cram yourself in a tiny cubicle, effectively creating blinders to protect against distraction. If you are anything like me, you could be sitting in a completely empty white room and find a reason to stop doing work.
You sit in the cubicle, take out your snacks (yet another prepared distraction) and dread beginning the long night ahead of you. You sit back, take a look around at all of the seemingly productive students, and instead of providing inspiration, they simply fuel your procrastination. You slam your head down on the desk, wondering what you are doing there. As you turn your head to the side, you notice the unmistakably prevalent graffiti on the side of the desk walls. Ah, you can surely waste another ten minutes examining the legacy of past students like yourself.
If you couldn’t already tell, I am certainly speaking from past experience. Having sat in a library cubicle in complete desperation, I know what it’s like to search for some kind of connection with someone else who may have previously been in your particular situation. I believe that we have many things to learn from these marks from the past, and even if they aren’t always the most intelligent or mature markings, they are certainly entertaining.
So, here you are, finding yourself completely enthralled by the ghosts of all-nighters past. You allow yourself a bittersweet chuckle at things like “KILL ME” in black, scratchy pen, and “This paper SUCKS.” Once you start to look closer, however, you find that there are some more interesting messages etched deep into the wood.
In making this library escapade much longer than it needed to be (especially when I still had a fifteen page paper to write), I discovered something that I think inextricably links generations of BC students. The academic struggle and BC experience as a whole can be seen in that side panel of the library cubicle. Those dire moments in the library is certainly a shared experience here at BC, and is a quintessential expression of our precious time experiencing the world that is college.
So, you may ask, what exactly are the lessons to be learned from a decorated library cubicle? Well, first, you could learn from others past experience to figure out that pulling an all-nighter in a library cubicle isn’t the most pleasant experience on the planet. But on a slightly deeper note, reading what students before me chose to make permanent on their cubicle of choice made me feel like a greater part of a whole community. So next time you head to the lib to crank out a paper, plop yourself at a cubicle, and take a gander at the messages that surround you. Trust me, it will provide you with some serious entertainment trying to picture someone actually writing something like that, as well as comfort in knowing that you are not alone.
Photo Sources:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bostoncollege/7950096484/