Please put me out of my misery.

It’s another busy day at Columbia, and I have half an hour to get lunch and head to class. Ten minutes of travel time, 20 minutes for eating. Simple, right? 

Wrong. The Butler ramps become an obstacle course as I try to dodge two friend groups of three spreading out from railing to railing, walking in slow motion. I squeak out an “excuse me” as I accidentally bump someone’s bag. They barely spare me a look, and I move on. 

As I approach John Jay, I survey the four possible entrances. A pair of guys are parked right in front of the closest door, so I change course to the second door from the right.

I check my phone – 25 more minutes. I keep to the right as I approach the tap desk, but I have to veer left twice as two separate men wearing Columbia baseball shirts walk straight at me. I tap my ID. I’m in. 

But the challenge has just begun. The girl on her phone in front of me stops mid-step, and I screech to a halt. I divert my sigh through my nose so it’s not audible and move around her to stick my bag on the counter. 

I make an attempt to move into the main pathway but am foiled twice by two passersby. On the third try, I find a gap behind a group of men in suits. I follow them into the dining hall, but they find another group of guys who must be their friends because they form a human blob, blocking off the only entrance to my daily John Jay pasta run. 

My mental energy is running low at this point, so I don’t bother to say sorry before lightly shoulder-checking one of them and pushing my way through. He looks at me like I just said Goldman Sachs is better than J.P. Morgan. But the pasta is in my sights now, which gives me the strength to grab my food, squeeze past the same group, and have a glorious 10 whole minutes of sitting time before I repeat the process. 

This is a description of a particularly bad day I had last week, but it’s far from atypical. I have yet to enter a dining hall between 11 and 1 where I didn’t have to bob and weave between clumps of people inconveniently stationed in front of doors, tables, and food stations. 

So what’s turning this campus into a glorified game of Frogger? On the one hand, it’s just crowded. There are nearly 10,000 undergrads at CC, SEAS, and GS alone. For the most part, we’re all packed around a quad about the size of a football field.

But the people in these scenarios all have one thing in common: a complete lack of spatial awareness. Or lack of motivation to care that they might be inconveniencing others (i.e., me). 

As much as I love being a hater, I genuinely want this campus to run more smoothly for everyone. For the public good, I’ve compiled a list of tips that will make navigating this campus easier and enable me to spend less time hating! 

1. Broadly speaking, there are three parts of a walkway: the middle and the two edges. If you’ve stopped to talk, consider making use of the edges! 
2. You might find yourself being elbowed less if you avoid congregating in high-traffic spots like the doors of Butler or the bottom of the stairs in Ferris. I promise you can talk about your club application just as effectively if you move three feet to the left. 
3. Stop looking at TikTok when you walk. I’m begging you. There are too many people and too many barricades for you not to run into something and/or someone. 
4. Social norms (backed up by traffic laws) dictate that we drive on the right side of the road. This helps cars not collide head-on and keeps our streets drivable. I thought we had also tacitly agreed to walk on the right side of the sidewalk for similar (albeit less deadly) reasons. Coming to this school has proved me very, very wrong. Consider fulfilling your part of the social contract, and use the right side! 

This list is non-exhaustive. If you find yourself in a scenario not covered in this article, you may find the theory of mind a helpful tool. You live in a world with other people in it; other people who also have thoughts, feelings, and goals. Nine times out of ten, remembering this simple fact will help you figure out your next course of action. 

Next time, before you start walking backwards as you say goodbye to your friend, think to yourself that since other people exist, someone could be behind you. More importantly, they probably won’t be thrilled if you run into them! If you’re taking time to decide whether you want whole wheat or regular pasta, consider that the person in line has interiority and probably just wants to get their damn pasta. Not speaking from experience or anything. 

Consider this piece not a hate letter, but a love letter. I want better for the busy students of this campus. We have enough on our plates without making walking to class a chore. But honestly? I would just appreciate getting body-checked a little less.

Low Library via Flickr