It’s that time of year again. When working on a college campus gives you a front row seat to all the excitement and worry and panic and dread that hangs over this collegiate land.
The end of the semester.
Exam week looms. Graduation sits perched on the horizon, taunting, haunting, teasing students. “Come and get me!” Some desperately want it. Others want it to go away. A few have been chasing it for so long, but still don’t have a clue how to bait the hook and catch it.
What was that line from Jim Morrison of The Doors? “This is the end. My only friend, the end.”
It never made sense to me that song, but you work on a college campus and that line always takes on new meaning.
I love having an office in the library this time of year. It’s like going to a sporting event the final week of classes. You witness the highs and the lows. The thrill of victory. The agony of defeat. The smiling faces. The kid standing by the printer, mumbling to no one in particular as pages of a final paper are spit into his hand: “In your face! I did it. Ha!” Or the tears. The same kid: “What do you mean you’re out of paper!?! I have class in 13 seconds!”
Others are so worked up and exhausted from the stress and late nights that they sit at tables staring at books, struggling to remember how to open them. “I don’t get it! Does it need a password? It worked for me yesterday! Where’s the on button?”
The pressure. The fatigue. If you’re graduating, the age-old question of what you’ll wear under the robe. Because, I mean, no one’s going to see what you’re wearing, yet you still have to spend time figuring it out.
This is the time of year that students race up to my office on the third floor, panting and out-of-breath. There’s a wild look in their eyes. Fear!
“Mr. Thompson! Mr. Thompson!” they call out, knocking on my door.
“Yes,” I answer casually.
“Nobody was in class … I finished my paper … Is it late? … Here it is … Please don’t be mad … I don’t want to work in an insulation factory … I need to graduate … I’m so sorry!”
“Oh, OK, thanks,” I tell them, wanting to be encouraging. Not wanting to crush them. But I have no choice. I have to tell them the horrible, awful truth. “Um … so, uh … you know your paper isn’t due ‘til Thursday, right?”
They stand there and stare at me. I’m afraid a circuit has fried. Then finally they scream out: “OH MY GOD! WRONG CLASS!!!” and then they race off in search of some other teacher.
My 7-year-old daughter listens to me tell these stories and then laments, “Those college kids!”
Indeed.
They come in carrying huge coffee cups. Massive, Big Gulp-size cups. The size of a small child. They cradle them like babies.
“Wo, man!” I said to one of my students snuggling his cup. “How many of those you had?”
He looked wired, like I might get electrocuted if I stood too close to him.
“These? Oh, only three. I’m cutting out milk and sugar. I might just start eating coffee grounds straight.”
He’s graduating next week. The pressure is on. Caffeine is his best friend.
It’s a tough time to be a college student. You feel the weight of the world riding on your shoulders. Parents, peers, teachers. Student loans are looming. You’re facing an economy that is chuckling under its breath as it slogs along. The real world is always a scary place. But for a lot of students across the country, it must feel like they’re being kicked out of the nest into a prickly briar patch.
I feel for them.
Yet, there’s an energy there. Fear hasn’t crushed them. This is a generation with a lot at stake. A lot to overcome. And they’re criticized for being slack or weak of spirit or apathetic. Maybe so. But I also see perseverance. Pride. Passion. A little spark that isn’t always evident. They’re hungry, and they can work incredibly hard if given a shot. They just want a shot.
Maybe it’s not all panic and fear. Maybe they’re not doomed. They have some things in their corner this last week: coffee to fuel them, a printer full of paper and a fuzzy Doors song to get them through. “This is the end. My only friend, the end.”