Senior Staff Writer Levi Cohen on the agony and the ecstasy of the start of the semester.

They call it the Butler-industrial complex

Okay, in theory, I kind of get it. “New year, new me,” you say to yourselves, stifling tears as you shuffle through syllabi, looking ahead at problem sets and projects and midterms. Maybe you ducked in to ButCaf to grab a coffee and, whilst standing on line, looked around and thought, “Hm, this studious atmosphere may be just what I need to start this semester off on the right foot.” You might even have a semi-valid excuse: a distracting roommate, say, or the lure of having your bed right next to your desk. I see these reasons, and I hear them.

But you’re better than this. Consider this an intervention.

We have had four days of classes. You will have been to most of your classes only twice by now, or even just once if it’s Mo/We or a seminar. The first session was your run-of-the-mill syllabus distribution, awkward introduction, maybe even a preparatory lecture (in one of my classes, the teacher called it “Lecture Zero” – that’s how unimportant it was). Absolutely nothing requires you to be in Butler right now: you shouldn’t be in the 24-hour rooms, nor the stacks, nor the upper-floor carels… I weep for you all. Unless you’re graduate students, whose pain and torment obeys no semesterly timeline, you are doing nothing but torturing yourselves.

Then again, I don’t know your life! Maybe you’re SEAS, and your life is far more hellish than mine. Perhaps you’re of the ilk that does readings for Core classes on time, and you find that a change of locale every once in a while helps keep you focused. (To which I say: go to a cafe and order the cheapest thing they have.) Maybe there is something to this whole “Butler in January” shtick. Am I so out of touch?

No, it’s the children who are wrong.

(At the very least, just go to Avery, while it’s still standing.)

Image via Bwog Archives