BLOG: The exciting life of the pretend-a-freshman
Overdue is my speciality
By Aisha Stern, blogger
November 4, 2007 | 8:05 p.m.
I've always been really good at procrastinating, but the past several weeks have started to show me that I've only been good at it because my life has let me put things off. Now, though, now my life is a mess of deadlines and classes, and I can't procrastinate. Practically speaking, it is just a little stupid of me to procrastinate.
And, yet, I've been finding ways. I'm not wasting time on the Internet -- I'm researching something. What, I don't know, but it might be something I want to know about later. Knowing everything there is to know about digital cameras now could save me a lot of pain later, if I decide that I want to spend the rest of my life taking pictures. I'm not vegging out and watching a movie, I'm studying how they use light and angles to manipulate a scene. Granted, that excuse would work a lot better if I were taking any sort of film class, but if I ever do take a film class, I've already got experience!
I find a lot of ways to procrastinate, from baking to research to prioritizing. I love prioritizing. If I don't feel like writing a paper, I can justify not writing it by saying I have reading to do, or need to check my various e-mails. You never know when your area-specific recruiter might e-mail you to tell you even more useless things about their campus. Sure, I don't really care about what they have to say, but what if they say something that would really contribute to those pro/con lists I've been meaning to start?
If I can find ways to procrastinate, I usually do. Some of my college applications are due in two months, which really isn't that far away, even though it sounds like it is. I have a countdown of various dates on a wipe board in my room, and I know that two months really is not that far away because my birthday, which was three months away not that long ago, is all of a sudden three and a half weeks away.
Anyway, college applications. I've been meaning to start those, but they keep falling low on my priorities. If you broke my life down into a list of 10 things to do, they might crack the top 15. It's hard to take applications seriously when you're already in college, especially when you don't know what you want to major in. That's my reasoning, anyway. I figure it will hold up for another three weeks, but I suspect that the minute I finish eating Thanksgiving dinner, the cold hand of terror will wrap around my throat and make me realize that I only have a few weeks until the colleges of my choice will stop accepting my applications. In that moment, I know I'll realize that if I don't start working my ass off, I might just end up stuck in Athens for at least one -- if not four -- more years. The thought of that alone is almost enough to get me to never procrastinate again.
But then I figure that I'll sink into a turkey induced stupor and forget about the possibility of being here for another four years for at least another week.
I guess my point is that, given the opportunity, I procrastinate. Not even the all mighty power of college and set test dates has completely broken me of that, and I doubt anything ever will. Just remind me of saying that when I post about being in a time crunch in a couple weeks.
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