Her Campus Logo Her Campus Logo
Life

20 Things Only the Chronically Late Will Understand

1. This internal dialogue: “Okay, so if I get up now, I have 15 minutes to change and 10 to be out the door. Easy!”

“…That is, if I even make it out of bed in the next half hour.”

2. The fact that starting a project an hour before it’s due has become so second-nature to you that you aren’t even sure if you could get started earlier and actually finish it

3. Swearing every time you’re late that this will be the last time

But you mean it this time! …Okay, or maybe once or twice more.

4. Your friends are so used to your lateness that they’ve started telling you events start earlier than they actually do

That way, you might just manage to be a couple minutes late instead of twenty.

5. You’ve downloaded at least three different calendar apps by now

And you’ll keep downloading them for the rest of your life… One of them has got to actually be helpful!

6. Getting a watch as a passive aggressive birthday present

With a card that might even have a little doodle of the white rabbit on it. That’s you!

7. The satisfaction of running into a room just as the clock ticks the exact minute you were supposed to arrive

Shouldn’t you be getting some kind of award for this?

8. Professors’ glares and pauses when you walk in late and have to take about three hours to find somewhere to sit down in the lecture hall

Sometimes you have to just give up and sit on the floor anyways.

9. Real adrenaline rushes come from work emails asking how the project you have due tomorrow is coming along

It’s going great, boss! I’ve definitely actually started working on it. Totally didn’t forget about it until I got this email just now. Just gonna stay up all night working on that…

10. Missing the openers at concerts, which can be either a blessing or a curse

Either you were pumped to watch them open, or you didn’t know who they were anyway and now you’re that much closer to seeing the headliners come on!  

11. “Hey, remember when that thing happened yesterday?” “No, what?” “You were here!”

But you were late. Late enough to miss that hilarious thing that happened in the fifteen minutes before you arrived. It’s okay, you’ll hear your friends telling their kids about it in a few years. It was that funny.

12. Questioning how you still have any friends even though you’ve made them all wait half an hour for you to show up at least once…

13. And being grateful that they still love you anyway!

14. Apologizing at least three times a week while all flustered and exhausted

I’m really sorry it took me so long—You can tell by how out of breath I am right now, right?

15. That awkward moment when your excuse for your lateness sounds totally fake—but it isn’t!

16. The internal debate over whether to actually come up with a fake excuse or not

And these are the ones that sound more real…At least, you hope so.

17. Getting ready to leave in 15 minutes, flat

You have an 8 a.m. tomorrow? It’s cool, you can totally wake up at 7:45 and make it there on time. Probably.

18. The satisfaction of arriving somewhere early for once…

19. And the total cluelessness about what to do until the actual starting time

20. Having everyone’s eyes on you when you walk into a room late

Kayla is a second year student at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she's studying literature and history. She loves working with kids, and has worked at the same summer camp for the past four summers. Someday, she hopes to become a high school English teacher. You can follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/kaylaeatskale and find all of her work at www.clippings.me/kaylalayaoen