Pre-Term Ends (you may now use the restroom)

By Conor | August 31st, 2008 | No Comments

Pre-term ended on Thursday, and the mood at Stern during the final gathering in Shimmel Auditorium was jubilant.

Thinking about it now, there was not a whole lot of reason for jubilance. One could even argue such jubilation was, let’s say, slightly irrational. (Three sentences, three iterations of the word jubilant. I’m on fire.) However, because I was amongst the throngs who were jubilantly (that’s four) celebrating, it looks like I am going to have to take a long look at the man in the mirror and come up with an answer/change my ways.

As I see it, there are a few interpretations for the mood.

The first interpretation, in my mind, was that this was kind of a practice for graduation. We completed something. There was a beginning and an end, and we were all gathered together in one place. There was a certain sense of accomplishment in the air, though it is debatable what we had accomplished up to that point aside from making it through a period of time so chock full of presentations that we hadn’t used the restroom in nine days. (I’d like to see David Blaine try that little stunt.)

From that standpoint – the non-ruptured bladder standpoint – I can see cause for celebration.

A second interpretation is that the class – as a whole, but especially each block (made up of 60 plus students) – was far more intimate following a week which culminated in group talent shows. I’ll tell you something: there is nothing like working creatively with a small group to bring that group closer together. (Except maybe being trapped in a mine together. That’ll bond folks right up – or so the Lifetime Channel would have me believe.)

The reasoning goes like this: everybody in the audience on that final day had been in a study group, and was now feeling closer to those other five people in their group. Moreover, after each group had presented their “talents” for their respective blocks, I have to believe that a sense of intimacy was created within those blocks. Let’s face it – we were all desperately concerned about looking completely and utterly ridiculous in front of our classmates. And perhaps we did. But we went through it together, and that created a bond. (Like those dudes in the mine shaft – I’m serious, did you see that? Remind me never to get trapped in a mine.)

Thus, by the time of our final time together, people were feeling rowdy. We were letting go. We had embarrassed ourselves, we had watched others embarrass themselves, and we watched the winning talent shows from each block embarrass themselves in front of the entire class.

And yet, none of it was really embarrassing at all. People were hilarious. And talented. And fun to watch and brave and remarkably creative. It was awesome. Really.

A final interpretation for the day’s mood is simply this: Pre-Term worked. For as much as we complained about it going through it, it was informative and fun and an outstanding opportunity to meet the classmates with whom we will be spending inordinate amounts of time over the next two years. For evidence of this, look no further than comparing the final day with nine days earlier, in the same room, during the opening session. Slightly nervous, high anticipation, restrained introductions, versus Thursday, when people were flinging paper airplanes and body-surfacing around the auditorium.

Pre-term worked. We know each other, or a lot of people know a lot of other people, and the year hasn’t even officially begun yet. That’s success – any trauma to the bladder notwithstanding, of course.

So it begins. Tuesday is the first day of class. I’m pretty sure I have another accounting exam, which makes me want to lock myself in a mail sack. The air will be decidedly less jubilentational, and I’m guessing we will shortly all be looking back fondly on those carefree days of pre-term, when school work was a distant concept, when US Open tickets were given out like bourbon chicken at Panda Express, and when we had to pee so bad we thought we would pass out.