Three Different Nights in College

By   |  August 25, 2009

The All-Nighter

The vending machine hums, the soft sound of fingers pressing keys floats through the air and the street lights flicker in the distance. The empty frappuccino bottles, used pencils and fliers fighting desperately for one cause or another lay strewn across the warped wood tables. As the world slowly begins to wake up, I am still in the library because of my talented procrastination. But as always, in a world brimming with peers, where it is possible to feel so alone, I am not the only one living nocturnally. Several others are scattered around the fourth floor of the wonderful 24-hour library. The night began with many, each frantically pumping out that last sentence or crunching that last number, and simultaneously sneaking glances at their Facebook news feeds and updating their twitter. Yet gradually the library emptied out, as did the Mountain Dews and Double Shots from the vending machine. In a library filled with books few are being used. Instead, our eyes are drawn to the backlight of our energy-sucking laptops. Words have flown from our brains to our screens to printer paper. As the sun begins to peek over the horizon I head to the dining hall, one of the few times I will ever have breakfast.

The Party

The music vibrates the floor and several people sway and chat holding their full Solo cups. My entourage (hahaha) and I hesitantly walk through the door, painfully aware of our first-year status. We head to the kitchen. The counter is packed with an army of mixers, cheap liquor and a few straws. The floor is still dry, but soon it will have a thin film of jungle juice and beer that has overflowed from the plastic cups. Someone gathers up the pong balls and finds a table. The games begin. Someone yells, “Who wants a shot?” and the alcohol starts to flow freely. The dance floor is as packed as the kitchen counter. People flail. Shout. Rub up against each other. Someone stumbles outside to projectile-vomit up the day’s consumption. Cheers erupt for the winner of the pong table, and smack talk ensues. A few sober people laugh at the silly drunkards. The phrase “party foul” gets tossed around and someone in the middle of the dance floor finds someone else’s tongue. A few shirtless guys wander around, and several bad decisions are made. The rest is a blur of loud conversations and promiscuous choices. The next morning, I roll over and contemplate sleeping the day away. Sitting up just seems like such a bad idea.

“Home”..?

The soft glow of the 42-inch, flat-screen TV splashes across me as I sprawl out on the couch. I mute the late-night reruns and let the silence wash over me. My ears experience an absence of sound that is utterly nonexistent in the stained hallways of my dorm. My parents have long since kissed the top of my head and tucked themselves under the covers, leaving me to the wee hours of the morning. Three weeks into my first semester I am home for the weekend. But I feel like a vagabond. This town I grew up in — the same 18.5-square-mile, gerrymandered district where I learned to ride a bike, where I awkwardly swayed to my first slow dance and where I first felt the freedom of cruising down the highway in my very own car — this town feels like a ghost town.

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2 Comments on “Three Different Nights in College”  (RSS)

  1. Ha, I live in Irvine as well, and I can attest to that.It’s so boring here sometimes

  2. Very acute descriptions of some of the variety of my college nights. Nights at home do indeed make the place feel like a ghost town, since everyone is away. All nighters just suck in general, but I’ll be lucky to find a party night like that in Irvine. God help me.

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