There I was at the Barcelona airport this past December, sitting at the underwhelming and overpriced Caffè de Fiore. This was the long-anticipated, yet still somehow unexpected, end to my study abroad experience, a huge moment in the grand process that some of us like to call maturity. Yet, at that very moment, all I kept asking myself was, “Where the hell is my Baconburger I ordered at the bar over 25 minutes ago?!”
Table service never will be a strong point in Barcelona (maybe because no one tips, but I was just a ravenous student who would have rather eaten the next person he saw than talk to him), but that lack of service was an impressive display even for Barça’s standards. So impressive that I considered not inquiring about the burger’s whereabouts. But I took five seconds and inquired because my stomach was eating itself. Apparently, I was supposed to pick my meal up from the bar.
NU (more generally America), I missed your hospitality.
This moment brought to you by a nonexistent, laissez-faire waiting staff has motivated me to reflect upon a few things. I feel like we don’t take even five minutes per day to observe ourselves in context. Without getting too existential and philosophical (although I’m sure you’re enthralled by the idea that I could keep going), think about how many times you have experienced the following scenarios:
Scenario 1: you proclaim, “FML. My life sucks. All I do is study! Why can’t I rage like students at other schools? My phone number should be 247-365-RAGE!”
Scenario 2: you proclaim, “FML. My life sucks. All I do is study so I can ensure I make minimum six-figure salaries for the rest of my life! Why can’t I rage like students at other schools? Oh, I know why: it’s because I’ve been blessed with incredible genes and want to actually do something with them rather than continue corroding my liver. Maybe I’ll only go out three nights per week?”
If you have come to the conclusion that you are more scenario 2 than scenario 1, search me out at the Keg, and I will legitimately buy you one of Evanston’s finest beers. Anytime someone says FML about some petty thing, I fire back, “Yes, F YOUR L because it’s so horrible.” At the end of the day, waiting 30 extra minutes for a heart-attack-on-wheels Baconburger or not having brown-nosing waiters is unfortunate, but neither of these is worth crying about.
I’m sure some of you have contemplated overthrowing your best intentions of reading a textbook per night in some of your courses (e.g. Professor Mark Witte’s public finance course) in favor of going out. Truthfully, I have little basis upon which to disagree with such an academic coup d’état. Many times, the workload is excessive, not unlike my pick-up lines. (Now that I think about it, all the single ladies choose scenario 1. I want to try some new lines out.)
Regardless, we do have to find a way to accomplish what is asked of us. When I struggle to press on during one of my sparse reading sessions, I take five minutes, 3 minutes 43 seconds of which are dedicated to Ke$ha’s masterpiece “Take It Off” (Ke$ha scored 1500 on her SAT before she dropped out of high school, two facts that, by themselves, force me to persevere), and whenever the chorus comes on, I replace “And they turn me on / when they take it off” with “And I turn her on / when I read it now.”
The owls are justifiably judging from their perches right now, but this lame act helps me keep things in perspective. We attend the 12th-best college out of more than 4,000 American universities. Taking five minutes per day to self-evaluate or refocus is by no means revolutionary, but over time, it could be life-altering.
Steve Hofmann is a Weinberg junior. He can be reached at [email protected].
