What have I been thinking recently?

Not a whole lot if I’m honest. I’ve been listening to a lot of podcasts. Pretending the sun is way warmer than it actually is. I went oUt oUt on Thursday; that was exciting. I watched The Little Mermaid yesterday.

I’ve been kind of tired.

We’re in the very last stretch of the university year and intellectually, I’m exhausted. I’m not walking around like a zombie, sleeping 15 hours a day – though I do generally need 9-10 hours of sleep a day to function, but that’s besides the point. I’ve been having a great time over the last couple of weeks, seeing and spending time with my friends and family and getting excited about restrictions easing. But during all the laughs there’s still this constant nagging in my head reminding me that I’ve got work and deadlines, and it’s making me really tired.

It’s not that I don’t enjoy my degree, because I honestly do find researching and writing essays, and speaking foreign languages incredibly fun. But this last academic year has been so taxing and I’m just bored of looking at screens. I don’t want to have to open up my laptop and sit for at least 5 hours a day doing vocabulary, or grammar exercises, or researching and writing essays. I look at the blank digital pages where my 2,500-word essay should be and though I’ve never struggled to have opinions, I feel like I have nothing worthwhile to say anymore. So I avoid it, but that only makes the process longer.

It’s just that the sun’s coming out, and restrictions are finally lifting after the most stressful year of pretty much everyone’s lives, but those deadlines still beckon. (!!) And I know that it might sound like I’m complaining about nothing but my friends and I have had a year of online university-learning and it’s been really hard. Just last term, we would each walk around the house letting out short screams or hysterical laughter or mantras of ‘can’t be arsed, can’t be arsed, can’t be arsed, I can do it, I can do it, don’t wanna do it, have to do it, gunna do it’ from the kitchen all the way back to our laptops, on our desks, in our rooms. And whilst it was always kind of funny to hear who was ‘losing it’ today, the stress and lack of motivation have been rEAl this year.

Nonetheless, even though we’re all burnt the fuck out, there’s really not that long left now: last push and then we can spend a day not studying, without feeling guilty about it or reaping the consequences the next time we sit down at our desks.

So, back to the laptop screens we go, but just for a few more weeks this time kids. Deep breaths.

Xx