The Night Starts Here

There's something inexplicably alluring about the wee hours of the night. Or is it the wee hours of the morning? You know what I mean.

So begins my biannual camp-outs here in the SLC. Gotta love its 24 hours of operation, JUST for us students who study like this during finals. Woohoo. The silence and near-emptiness of the building is eerie and uncanny, but I just love it so much. Because usually, there are kids walking around all over the place, it's noisy, it smells like sweat and coffee, tables are crowded, bathrooms are crowded, computers are occupied. But at a time like this, it's...peaceful. Calm. I kinda wish the SLC were open 24 hours most of, if not all, the time.

Call me crazy, but I kinda like spending the nights in this building. It's brutal. I'm probably inches away from contracting some volatile illness every time I do this. But something about arming myself with coffee, energy drinks, food, layers of warm clothing, and a steely determination make the experience so pleasant. Meh.

But hey, I'm not as bad as some kids. The SLC has quite a number of group study rooms scattered throughout its floors. These have lock-less doors and large floor to ceiling windows so you can see in/out of the room (wouldn't want people doing illicit things in these rooms behind lock doors...meh heh heh).  During the day and until about 12AM, these rooms are high in demand just because they provide some isolation from the busy atmosphere. So last year during finals time, I made my nightly visits, and after several returns, I noticed one or two rooms always had the same group of people in them. I realized, these people were rotating out so they could always have this room! They had some blankets and even pulled in some of the lounge chairs, sometimes boxes of take out and pizza were strewn across the floor and table. These kids took turns staking out this room to ensure they always had a place to study, since it's damn near IMPOSSIBLE to find even a place to sit in this building during the day during finals. Seeing these kids go to lengths to keep this spot was so sad to bear...and yet I felt unusually envious. I wish I had a group of friends that would camp out with me in the SLC during finals time. They just think I'm crazy I even come to the SLC at such late hours. Hmph.

So I spend nights in the SLC. Go to class/take my final, go home, sleep until about 6-8PM, wake up, eat, repeat. Fun times.

I just function better during the night. Walking outside through campus where there isn't a single person around nor a car that drives by is quite calming. I can think better, more clearly.

And because I think more clearly, I can rationalize myself. Nowadays it almost seems like I'm bipolar. I'll go from super content, happy, life's good/I know what I'm doing and it's alright everything's fine one day, to depressed, mopey, god-why-do-I-do-this-what's-the-fucking-point on another day.

In recent days, I'm surprised at you. I realize I didn't need your condescending pity, your hypocrisy. I can't stand arrogance. Your fakeness. Which I find cruelly ironic because fakeness was something you used to be adamantly against, but I guess people change. And, I didn't think you were that type of person who would do something like that.

I know I'm being extremely passive-agressive about this. But I guess some people don't change.

Also now that I've had time to think about it more, I feel I wasn't given the whole truth, that there was something you failed to bring up that night, but it's ok because maybe you didn't realize it then, and maybe today you still don't, but now I do. I guess people change.



Well this has been a mildly interesting spectrum of feelings. Let's end with a song, shall we? If you're expecting the song I've aptly used as the title, I'm afraid I have unfortunate news for you: it's not gonna be that song. Instead, I've lately been in a Ben Folds groove, and I just dig his recent album.

Ben Folds, with Nick Hornby (lyrics), "From Above"

Isn't this music video just grand?