At about 3 o’clock today I finished the last in my first series of exams for this fall semester. Achy and tired, I felt as if I were crawling out from under a heavy pile of textbooks and slogging through the dregs from my coffee-pot.
I walked out of the test proctor’s office sat down in the campus’ grassy quad, closed eyes and turned my face toward late afternoon sun. During exams a younger rendering of myself used to meet my friend, Mac, every day on the CSU Oval. We’d quiz each other on our shared courses: Dendrology, Geology, Rangeland Ecology…lots of ologies.
One year, during spring finals, we met up for lunch and a Hydrology cram session in our usual spot. And, like an off-on switch I fell fast asleep. Never realized I was tired, went from talking (ka-plunk) to sleeping, then woke up in a puddle of drool in the grass. My books and note-cards were zipped up in my backpack. The sandwich wrappers, paper bags, spent napkins from lunch already landed in their proper trash receptacle. Mac was nowhere to be found. I wondered how long I had been sleeping there? Wondered what the proper amount of embarrassment would be for a 22 year old caught sleeping in a public space?
With my eyes closed today on the campus quad I realized I wouldn’t be at all embarrassed, now, to sleep. Wouldn’t particularly care who might find me napping on the quad. It was other things that kept me from it: the large pile of neglected laundry in my basement, the curry concoction I wanted to doctor up for dinner, Naomi needing me to pick her up in 45 minutes. Disorienting as it had once been to wake up on the campus oval it was a memory I was glad I could revisit if not recreate.
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