The University library….
It’s one of those places I go to, to make me feel better about myself and my life. When contemplating whether I’m an awful student or a de-motivated, apathetic human being, I try to convince myself I’m doing something worthwhile for the world. Maybe not revolutionising it but upping the education statistics enough for me to go ‘Yeah, I did that’. Plus the money’s not bad for starting a business…
When the abiding mountain of work becomes too much, almost enough that I still feel guilty about it after those five vodkas and coke, I decide I better do something about it…”but in half an hour though.”
I struggle to work in my student halls, not because I carry out the most mundane, procrastinated fuelled tasks I can think off, but because the library has a carpet and it’s soft.
Once I’ve assured myself the fifteen minute walk to the library will be worth it, even if I do plan just to sit down and pretend I’ve never seen a Facebook page before, I start to feel student-y. Not enough for me to get my student card out before I get to the library barrier though. Ironically, I’m happy to prep. my I.D before I get to the front of a potential god-awful club, it’s funny where my priorities lie.
I feel slightly better with myself once I’ve arrived at the library. I usually head to the second floor where all the necessary, pretty looking books that I am never going to read are. But I spend most of the time filled with fear at the silence that occupies the floor rather than possibility of educating myself. It’s so quiet, it actually pumps fear into me enough that I feel self-conscious about walking. The day I cough is the day I’ll be executed.
Once the mountain of the best colourful looking books that contain the least words and the most pictures has been compiled I find myself searching for a Mac. I hate Mac’s. But after the blood, sweat and tears of asking people who have forgotten what it’s like to see daylight, “is anybody using this?”, “Can I use this, please?”, “Let me, use this!”, I finally feel a little better about myself, so much so I give myself a Youtube video reward. Not the singular.
Solent’s library is nice enough, it has thousands of computers, which i’m pretty sure I somehow funded and its twirly stair case that makes me feel like I’ve wound up at the New-World-Order’s headquarters. My degree starts to feel a bit more worthwhile once the procrastination medals have been handed out and I’ve written the title of my essay on Word.
After a while you can see who goes to the library regularly, it’s usually the kid with the chequered shirt and his funny looking headphones. Although sometimes it’s the girl, who spends more time looking at her phone, wishing she was in Ibiza, than doing her fashion portfolio. Usually, the fashion students occupy most of the computers in the library, which is nice because my new favourite phrase “Will you be my girlfriend?” isn’t as creepy as it would be on a night out.
But the library does have its downfalls, mainly the fact that I’m there to actually do work. Although I do wish they’d put on a cool laser-light show just to make one o’clock in the morning feel like a better place.