An "un-Dull" life

Isn’t it overwhelming, just how much is expected of us, to live “successful” lives? Even just “adequate” ones require an immense amount of effort. As a student, I’m stuck wondering just how I will manage to survive! There is so much work to fit into one single day! It’s impossible!

I mean, usually our days are brimming with school work – classes run from 8am till 4pm. We’re assigned homework, projects and tests to study for. And the five minutes grace period between each lesson is spent hurriedly jogging from one end of the university to the other, simultaneously trying to swallow bites-sized bits of lunch! When classes finally finish, most of us leave for work. The part time job that keeps our petrol tanks full, but our social lives empty, runs another 6 hours into the night. With customers here, and children running there, and “Clean up on isle four!” all evening long, it’s a mad house that leaves no time for a weary mind. When the doors do close, finally we can head off home to the sanctuary of our rooms.

But, if you’re like me…you will know that the bedroom, is as much of a sanctuary as a building site. Shirts trail across the bedcovers; jeans crumple in piles across the floor. And those 3 inch black boots of yours lay waiting, just for the opportune moment to trip you up. It’s a mess! But, much too much to think about at eleven o clock at night. Setting your alarm for 4 the morning, after shifting layers of clothes to the chair behind your desk, you sink into that warm bed with a smile, and the reassurance that when you wake up…everything will be fine.

Which it usually isn’t. Because when that soft, sweet, twittering alarm bell gets you lunging across the room to silence it, and you again trip over the same 3 inch black boots as you did the night before, nothing is more alluring than to dive straight back beneath the covers for an extra hour (or two) of sleep. It’s around about 06:30 when you wake up to the mental reminder of the project you were meant to finish and hand in today. Also, the three hours of chemistry preparation you were supposed to do, and your session at the gym later this afternoon that you only realise now you don’t have clean clothes for. Add in the state of your room that that your mums bound to comment on, and that you still have to fit in a sensible, healthy meal at some point in time today… it’s enough you give you a mental breakdown!

But, that’s not only what life is about. Life is also about those stolen moments between classes, when you kiss your lover in a deserted classroom, or you laugh at a friend who accidentally smeared yoghurt across their brow. Life is about the sniggers you share with your friends at the lecturers’ funny accent, or the frantic seconds before a project’s due that you spend scribbling in the answers your pals are dictating to you. It’s about the cricket matches you play with your colleagues at work when the store is quiet, or trying to shoot each other with elastic bands as inconspicuously as possible, so that customers don’t notice anything amiss. Life is about getting home at twelve o clock at night, and drinking a final cup of tea whilst stroking your dogs’ sleepy head as together you watch the pale, luminescent moon riding in the darkness.

Life is about those fun, crazy, unexpected moments and the responsible ones too. They’re important for structure, for rules, and the smooth running of a day. Without them, there would be no secret kisses or rebellious games. They need each other to exist.

And, even though the sheer amount of work that needs attending to everyday is huge, I find that if I focus on just one responsibility or one stolen minute of fun at a time…without getting distracted by something in the future – or something from my past – everything seems manageable. And then, thinking of my life without it all, suddenly seems so dreadfully dull.