Snow Day

So, in addition to being a currently unemployed ESL teacher, I'm also a part-time grad student. I'm doing an online master's in curriculum design and ESL, and I have a little less than a year to go. I suck at making myself do the work. There are a million other bullshit things I'd rather be doing than writing a paper about the transferability of curriculum or horizontal articulation issues. Christ. Do you really expect me to waste my time on this drivel?? Days of Our Lives is on!

[Ok, I'd like it to be known that I categorically deny watching any Days of Our Lives episodes since about 1998.]

Anyway, tonight I have a paper I'm supposed to be writing. I have no job, I do mostly nothing but computer shit all day...why didn't I do this paper like a week in advance? I have no earthly idea. But, I think it all comes down to the theory of the "snow day".

Remember those? I grew up in Iowa, so we had plenty. Snow days were like gifts from god, and hopefully delivered on a big test day. It was always such a glorious experience... Waking up in the pre-dawn, exhausted and already defeated just by having to be awake at such an ungodly, sunless hour in the dead of winter. Then, gradually hearing the morning news playing on the living room TV, my mom watching to see if we would have to struggle to school that day. (She was a teacher, so her excitement for snow days almost rivaled that of me and my brother.) Eventually, I would sit up and peek out my window to inspect the carnage and then join my mom in the living room. Waiting, waiting, waiting as the alphabetical list of closed or delayed schools scrolled along the bottom of the screen. Then, a whoop of joy when my school's name finally appeared!

Of course, by this time, we were all awake enough to be hungry. So, my mom would make us some breakfast (a rarity, as we usually ate at my grandma's while my mom headed to school early). She might even make us hot chocolate, from scratch, if we promised to be quiet and let her go back to bed for awhile.


Eventually, around noon, we would usually walk to a nearby diner for lunch. What shitty, greasy food. But the fun of tromping through knee-high snow, in the middle of the street no less, was too much of an adventure to miss out on. And we were young enough to enjoy the pleasure of hanging out with our mom in the middle of the day on a random winter Tuesday.

I miss those times now.

But getting back to my theory of the "snow day" factor, the bottom line is that there is no greater pleasure than being told one need not do what one was anticipating must be done. You had a big test today? Forget about it, it's a snow day! Therefore, when I'm in a situation (such as having to write an annoying paper) in which I can create an excuse for myself as to why I can put the required action off, even for a short period of time...well, then it's like having a snow day! It's such a relief to not have to do what I was dreading, it actually becomes quite an addictive feeling.

Sadly, I have mastered the art of the snow day, as evidenced by my shocking lack of personal motivation in my studies. Even as I write this, I'm considering just going to bed and waking up early to write my paper in order to turn it in by 9.

*sigh*