College Anxiety by Tiffany Gu
It starts off as a ripple in a pond, a whisper followed by enough he-said-she-said to flood the world. “I heard University of Zimbabwe decisions come out today,” and even though it’s way before most decisions come out anyway, by the time we are all able to access a computer, the University of Zimbabwe’s website is completely backlogged, clogged with anxious seniors holding their breaths to see their fate. And maybe it held true for someone, somewhere, but for the majority of us, all that greets us when we log into these fancy admission websites is just a Thank You For Your Interest greeting, followed by Status: Pending. Back to the drawing board, I still know nothing. Nothing beyond the wild speculation of what some strange admissions officer might be thinking about me, whether right at this moment, someone is reading my application to judge whether I’m good enough or not.
Sitting around, twiddling thumbs, it’s not an ideal state to be in. College admission decisions rank one of the first things I think about when I wake up and the last before I go to sleep. Not only do thoughts of it drown out most others in my head, it drowns out most other conversation topics outside of it as well. With friends, for instance, I find it rather impossible to avoid the subject of college for very long. It’s difficult really, having friends just randomly blurt out, “I REALLY WANT TO GO TO COLLEGE, TIFFANY!” apropos of nothing. Because it isn’t really apropos of nothing, the tension and anxiety has been eating away at them forever, enough to cause spastic spasms all the time. It breaks the strongest of people, reduces them to crazy-eyed nervous wrecks. But the one good thing, I suppose if it can be called that, that comes from all this is a sense of solidarity unmatched by any other cause. Sit down next to any senior, and college talk is guaranteed to ensue. And will be able to perpetuate itself for hours. After all, this is all we’ve worked for, and now that we’ve gotten to this point, you can’t get us to shut up about it.
Worse than the actual waiting part, which is obviously to be expected, are the colleges that decide there isn’t possibly anything more fun than releasing their decision in batches and waves. A few people hear back from University of Zimbabwe, because, you know, everyone applies there. And, you know, everyone gets in too, so if you don’t, it’s kind of embarrassing. And so I, for one, am one for the refreshing-the-page-until-I-am-fed-up school of thinking when it comes to these types of decisions. Watching my friend’s AIM and Facebook statuses blink with joy, I GOT INTO UoZ OMG! It’s a pretty bad feeling, watching my screen stay the same as everyone else takes steps closer to their future. Why didn’t University of Zimbabwe let me know about whether they want me yet? Am I not good enough? Why didn’t they tell me yet, why why why? And it’s as if I were rejected, I start thinking about all the possible reasons as to why I haven’t heard back yet when obviously everyone else had. Mentally, I’ve knocked myself out of the race before I even had the chance.
One day, I realized that what I’ve been doing, what you’ve been doing too, probably, is just.. kind of ridiculous. How many applications do these institutions get every year? Thousands. We are just one of the countless hopefuls, countless high school seniors across the world sitting and twiddling and panicking, but for what? For a yes or a no that will come, regardless of how many hours we spend worrying. So, for the sake of my sanity, I let go of the F5 button and put my time into something more useful. Because I will get into college, and so will you, and spending the next few months with these people is more important than finding out a decision that’s already made the moment it happens. And these decisions, positive or negative, good or bad, will no more affect our future than however much we let them.
It starts off as a ripple in a pond, a whisper followed by enough he-said-she-said to flood the world. “I heard University of Zimbabwe decisions come out today,” and even though it’s way before most decisions come out anyway, by the time we are all able to access a computer, the University of Zimbabwe’s website is completely backlogged, clogged with anxious seniors holding their breaths to see their fate. And maybe it held true for someone, somewhere, but for the majority of us, all that greets us when we log into these fancy admission websites is just a Thank You For Your Interest greeting, followed by Status: Pending. Back to the drawing board, I still know nothing. Nothing beyond the wild speculation of what some strange admissions officer might be thinking about me, whether right at this moment, someone is reading my application to judge whether I’m good enough or not.
Sitting around, twiddling thumbs, it’s not an ideal state to be in. College admission decisions rank one of the first things I think about when I wake up and the last before I go to sleep. Not only do thoughts of it drown out most others in my head, it drowns out most other conversation topics outside of it as well. With friends, for instance, I find it rather impossible to avoid the subject of college for very long. It’s difficult really, having friends just randomly blurt out, “I REALLY WANT TO GO TO COLLEGE, TIFFANY!” apropos of nothing. Because it isn’t really apropos of nothing, the tension and anxiety has been eating away at them forever, enough to cause spastic spasms all the time. It breaks the strongest of people, reduces them to crazy-eyed nervous wrecks. But the one good thing, I suppose if it can be called that, that comes from all this is a sense of solidarity unmatched by any other cause. Sit down next to any senior, and college talk is guaranteed to ensue. And will be able to perpetuate itself for hours. After all, this is all we’ve worked for, and now that we’ve gotten to this point, you can’t get us to shut up about it.
Worse than the actual waiting part, which is obviously to be expected, are the colleges that decide there isn’t possibly anything more fun than releasing their decision in batches and waves. A few people hear back from University of Zimbabwe, because, you know, everyone applies there. And, you know, everyone gets in too, so if you don’t, it’s kind of embarrassing. And so I, for one, am one for the refreshing-the-page-until-I-am-fed-up school of thinking when it comes to these types of decisions. Watching my friend’s AIM and Facebook statuses blink with joy, I GOT INTO UoZ OMG! It’s a pretty bad feeling, watching my screen stay the same as everyone else takes steps closer to their future. Why didn’t University of Zimbabwe let me know about whether they want me yet? Am I not good enough? Why didn’t they tell me yet, why why why? And it’s as if I were rejected, I start thinking about all the possible reasons as to why I haven’t heard back yet when obviously everyone else had. Mentally, I’ve knocked myself out of the race before I even had the chance.
One day, I realized that what I’ve been doing, what you’ve been doing too, probably, is just.. kind of ridiculous. How many applications do these institutions get every year? Thousands. We are just one of the countless hopefuls, countless high school seniors across the world sitting and twiddling and panicking, but for what? For a yes or a no that will come, regardless of how many hours we spend worrying. So, for the sake of my sanity, I let go of the F5 button and put my time into something more useful. Because I will get into college, and so will you, and spending the next few months with these people is more important than finding out a decision that’s already made the moment it happens. And these decisions, positive or negative, good or bad, will no more affect our future than however much we let them.