Testing Times

It was almost in a canter that I arrived at the exam hall, unaware that such complacence was misplaced given the speed at which the clock was ticking and how close it was to the starting time. As I laid my bag down outside the hall, I heard the fatal ring of the bell signalling the beginning of the exam.

Having been brought up to believe that being late for any event was an affront to humanity, a lack of punctuality always makes my conscience churn, though with age and an increased ability to rationalise, the churning is getting easier and easier to ignore.

There is something beautiful about a room where an exam has just began; the silence is pristine, there is none of the otherwise tangible pre-exam apprehension in the air which invariably rubs onto you and you are whisked to your seat as if you are an extremely important person. You don't have to wait anxiously for the question paper and answer sheet and you can put your head down and begin writing immediately.

The fact that it was the last exam after an entire week of exams on consecutive days had left me in a bend of mind that was sunny enough to think of these profundities as I was escorted to my seat.

Two hours later, the world seemed aglow, resplendent and full of endless possibilities. The hardest task ahead was to plan how much I would sleep, with "the more the merrier" being the answer that won out in the end, a true no-brainer if there ever was.

Then it struck. All the rosiness vanished, all the dreams faded and my world came crashing down. The planned slumber was not to be - other tasks awaited. A chunk of the work for a magazine whose responsibility was mine still remained. My Physics Lab notebook still looked like it wouldn't write itself, despite all my prayers. I had to talk to my parents and sisters, after a week of reduced correspondence due to the exams. My tickets for a weekend trip home had to be booked. All that had been put away to the "after exams" time frame came back to haunt me big time.

There is something definitively gloomy about entering your room and not finding your roommate there; a partner to share the joy of the ending of exams with you. Even though one of us entering the room is punctuated with a casual Hi!, I am always genuinely thrilled to see him, and I would hope the feeling is mutual. Though our room seems like it is silent apart from two laptops running and keyboard keys being keyed, in hindsight, the amount of conversation is in fact very large, often very deep.

And so, with the whole whole post-exam workload, when I walked in to find my roommate sleeping so peacefully, the injustice of it all struck. The constant workload, the immense responsibility you take upon yourself to no avail, the plethora of tasks that for some reason, are always at your doorstep, your blog that has to be updated; all of it!

I will fight it, I thought to myself, prove that the world is simply giving me my due while I lag behind, procrastinating, excusing myself, distracting myself and eventually paying the price.

All the thinking made me tired, and before long, I was asleep, as blissfully as my beloved roomie. Good times, I say!