Back from Thanksgiving break and plunged straight into finals season. What will fall to the wayside, and what will get done? Who’s to say?

Time is the cold, unrelenting monarch of existence. Impossible to escape, and constantly advancing. Post-travel suitcases, in my opinion, bear the brunt of time’s cruelty. They are strewn haphazardly on the floor, picked through for specific items, and witness the existential crisis everyone (I hope?) has after a break. 

My suitcase is certainly bearing witness to madness. 

Packed with the Christmas dorm decorations my mother sent me back to school with still sitting unused. How can I have time to decorate when I haven’t even done laundry in weeks? The agenda is full, my sanity waning, and my suitcase lying neglected. This article itself is a procrastination of a research paper I haven’t started, due tomorrow. Imposter syndrome is weighing heavily. 

In the coming weeks, I will no doubt search through it to find a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt, or a top to wear and the contents will dwindle, leaving those remaining even more alone, until I finally repack everything to return to a lifeless corner of Ohio for winter break. 

My roommate predicts that nothing will be unpacked before I leave, sending me spiraling further about how others perceive me. Another friend agrees that I’ll go rummaging for a few specific items, but that I’ll get it mostly unpacked before the reading period. I’m reassured.

I’m lying on the floor with my laptop at a 90° angle, typing with one finger. My suitcase is prostrated not three feet away, judging my value as a human being, wishing I would stop playing Scheiße by Lady Gaga on repeat. I will not. Maybe tomorrow it’ll be Bloody Mary.

Why can’t I just put everything away? I theoretically have the time. But as unrelenting as time is, why would I want to spend it putting things away?

I don’t.

My roommate was right. It’s not getting unpacked.

Sad Suitcase via Hippopx