[from @coochieflop]
Happy (almost) Thanksgiving, what is (unpopularly) one of my least favorite holidays, and the graphic above just about sums up my feelings toward the festivities. Except for my freshman year of college, I will have spent every Thanksgiving of my college years in California instead of making the long trek home to Florida, but I’ve found creative ways to entertain myself while campus is vacant for those brief few days (a lot less sad than it sounds, I promise).
But campus is empty this year, and has been for quite some time due to the infamous COVID-19 pandemic, a phrase you and I are both exhausted by but must still respect like a professor who might bump up our grade from a B+ to an A- if we act right. As my fall semester will finally, finally come to an end in the next couple of days, I want to trace the progression of this academic journey for all of its bumps, dips and lessons learned (and largely not learned) along the way.
Oh yes, today’s edition is all about reflecting on the one thing every student loves to hate: Zoom University.
If you were to tell junior year Rowan of last fall that a year from then she would be completing her senior year classes online and would only step foot onto campus to take a COVID-19 test, she probably would have given you a *look* before saying she had to run off to some meeting. At the time, the world seemed to be my heavily secured oyster: I was eager to leave USC for a semester to begin my first overseas adventure for study abroad and flaunt around as a grade-A fláneuse. Fast forward, now in the eight month of the pandemic, I’m sitting at my friend’s outdoor picnic table for a change of scenery while I crank out my finals and drink spiked cider because I Just Can’t Take It Anymore in my townhouse.
[There are multiple parts to this series, and I highly recommend watching all of them.]
From March until now, I have collected three main critiques of Zoom University: Academics, well-being and community. In collaboration, these three elements make up the full schooling experience, with room for at least one piece to struggle along the way. When everything’s online — as they should be with the state of the world, unfortunately — the glue between the three becomes disjointed. Academics are more about getting sh*t done instead of creating something impactful. Our well-being is tied to the battery power of our laptops. Community is as good as the looming “End Meeting” button and, if you’re lucky, who you can wave at in your neighborhood while on your daily quarantine walk.
So, we’re left questioning what we’re even doing this all for, if not to maintain the richness and chaos of university life we’re accustomed to having. Our priorities have forcibly shifted from outward stimulation to personal fulfillment, but doing everything on your own for your own has its limits.
A topic my friends and I keep returning to is that of grief: Mourning the loss of our college experience, abandoned spaces once filled with lively crowds, friends we’ll likely never see again, trusting chance encounters with strangers, bad parties that make for great memories (or the lack thereof), and the list goes on. For me, the pain is less in the traditional big moments I’ve accepted I won’t have — a graduation ceremony, my last football game, walking out of an undergraduate classroom for the final time — but is more in the small moments: Transitioning from home to campus and running into loose acquaintances along my daily walk, studying but not studying in a library until 2 a.m. (what I would give to do work in a library right now), watching a relaxed biker crash into a rushed skateboarder at 9 a.m. (kind of bad, kind of funny), and stumbling upon random campus events and bustle that are just so college.
Of course, my complaints are very privileged, as being able to pursue higher education alone is an immense privilege. I’m fortunate to not have experienced personal COVID-related loss (nor have I had ‘rona itself), but regardless of your situation, the overarching theme of 2020 is Collective Loss, point-blank. We all deserve to mourn the livelihoods we’ve lost, but grieving should only serve as a stepping-stone to pivoting and embracing a life many of us stopped trying to predict long ago. This isn’t the “new normal” anymore (another phrase I detest). This just is.
Sure, this newsletter-turned-personal-essay is a bit more on the depressing side, but blame my overwhelming sentimental nature that always hits me hard at the end of every semester, especially this one. If you’d like my alternate, more inspiring take on adjusting to big life changes during the pandemic, I’d recommend this letter I wrote to my future self for one of my finals (shameless plug).
At the very least, I’ll be done with this semester for good in less than 48 hours. Send me good thoughts (or at least good tweets) — I need it.
ON MY MIND
Going home for the holidays? Here are some things to mull over while stuck in your parents’ home.
This excerpt from Obama’s new book where he admits his collegiate academic pursuits were once a means to pick up girls has taken the Internet by storm. (Shoutout to the “ethereal bisexual” who was the real winner in the end).
I have been listening to Ben Platt’s cover of “Vienna” on repeat. Unpopular opinion? It may just be better than the original. (Sorry not sorry to any Billy Joel fans).
Roxane Gay’s opinion piece on student loan debt forgiveness for the New York Times
“A great many Americans are concerned with fairness only when they think someone else might get something they won’t get. And they are seething with resentment as they imagine a country in which we help one another. It’s appalling, that this is where we are … that this is who we are.”
This simple TikTok of a puppy sticking its tongue out has gotten me through finals.
My friend passed along a viral stand-up comedy video starring her USC writing instructor, and it’s pure gold. (If you have any other good recs for female comedians send them my way!)
That’s all! Until next time, see you online.
xoxo, Rowan <3
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twitter: @rowan_born // instagram: @rowanborn