Although April is the cruelest of months, it is a scientifically proven fact that February is the shortest of months. This is a shame, because it usually tends to be the busiest of months as well. By now, you’ve probably already started thinking about the most important decision you will make all semester: where to go over spring break.
This is not a choice to be trifled with. Screw up now and you’ll be regretting it later. One mistake in spring break plans and you’ll be spending the better part of March sitting on your parent’s couch watching bad VH1 recap shows, driving your cat to the veterinarian, and helping your mother make potpourri. This is assuming you don’t develop a drinking problem first. And not a fun spring break drinking problem, a sad old man drinking cough syrup drinking problem. Trust me.
Of course, trying to plan out your spring break is no walk in the park either. Without fail, you and your sensible group of friends eventually turn into an unruly mob that can’t seem to agree on anything. No matter how simple any plan starts out, it eventually becomes impossibly complex. Clauses and exceptions compound and any plan that starts out involving two people eventually ends up involving twenty. The road trip you and your roommate have been thinking about all year suddenly becomes a massive caravan involving twenty people, none of whom can agree on whose car they want to ride in, much less who is a vegetarian this week and who isn’t. Emergency meetings are called where everyone shouts at everyone else. Instances of careful diplomatic backstabbing become necessary to secure your piece of mind.
And for what? Spring break inevitably becomes one of two things: either a time to get absurdly drunk in either a foreign country or someone’s winter cottage, or a time to realize that you really don’t like the person who you’re dating. If you’re lucky, both things happen. Because break-ups aren’t any easier sober. But my point is that these sorts of trips aren’t usually fun, at least not for very long. Being friends with someone at school, where you occasionally see people between classes, at dinner, and at parties is a very different thing than spending all of your waking time with them. Get trapped in a car with anyone for too long and you’re likely to have fantasies about grabbing the wheel and directing the car into oncoming traffic. It’s a tough thing, traveling with your friends. You start noticing all sorts of things to hate about them that you never noticed before. And chances are, they’re feeling the same way. And let’s be honest, drinking isn’t going to help matters at all.
One thing that drinking is going to do, however, is ensure that you never get any work done. A lot of people bring their work on spring break with them. They assure themselves that they’ll read their course packets on the plane, or start working in the paper one afternoon. It’s no secret that no one ever does these things. The most work I ever did over spring break was drunkenly read the same two pages of Carl Jung’s autobiography over and over again until I convinced myself I’d reconciled my ego with the collective unconscious and then fell asleep. It just doesn’t happen. Nor should it. Spring break is a vacation for a reason.
Once you remind yourself of this fact, a paradox presents itself. Spring break is somehow both way too long and way too short. You’re anxious for your vacation to end so you can get the hell away from your friends. But there’s no way you want to go back to school. That would require work. And less intoxication. This is the problem with writing a thesis that’s due a few weeks after spring break. I know I actually won’t start writing my thesis until spring break. I have a long vacation in Olin to look forward to. A long vacation where the only debauchery I’m going to be enjoying is going to be about 15th century Burgundian pageantry. It’s certainly the anti-spring break, but I’m not that sure it’s going to be that much worse than any other idea. The only question is how long I’m going to be able to stand myself.
But all of you noble spring breakers, I wish you the best of luck in actually managing to have fun without getting alcohol poisoning. It’s a fine line, but I think it can be done. And if you come back from spring break, needing a vacation from your vacation, don’t fret. It’s all smooth sailing from here.
Except for figuring out your housing group.
But that should be easy, right?
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