Eyelids droop. Heads loll and wobble and sometimes settle right down on the desktop. Students sniffle and sneeze, reach for the tissues, run for the rest room and come back with harsh scratchy paper towels to wipe snot from tender red noses.
They're tired from play practice, football, long hours in the lab. They're missing class to compete in Model U.N., attend a funeral, row in a regatta in cold dark November. Who can sleep with so many papers and projects due all at once? Some pull all-nighters and then sleep through alarms; others panic and plagiarize, creating extra work and anguish for their harried professors.
Excuses
arrive daily: sick dogs, dead grandparents, someone's dad is in jail
and another needs rehab. Students feeling sick, self-harming, disgusted,
afraid. I offer extensions, refer them to the health center, tell them
it gets better, hope it's the truth.
November cloaks us in darkness, rides like the Headless Horseman through our dreams, drives us forward toward the breaking point--but it doesn't last forever. Thanksgiving is coming, and then Christmas, a bright beacon drawing us through the darkest part of the semester. If we can just hold on, it will all get better.
But still: better take tissues to class just in case.
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