Why does walking hurt? Today is June 5.
My dream last night took place inside of the St. Thomas More Newman Center. I’m not sure why, but I can distinctly remember the pews and aisles. Anyway, the dream involved teams of people cooking various meats for a competition. I remember looking over my shoulder to see another team winning and then waking up. I have absolutely no idea how any of the aspects of my dream go together, and I’m not sure if I want to know. Upon waking up, I contemplated my unconscious and subconscious thoughts before deciding analyzing my mind wasn’t worth it and deciding to eat French toast instead.
For the first hour and a half of my day, I lounged around and enjoyed my breakfast. I also watched the first episode of the latest season of Queer Eye about an out gay pastor. I’ve never been one for reality television ― I find the people boring and petty ― but I adore this show. Watching the heroes (the central person of each episode) grow and become more confident, accepting and comfortable in his/her/their own skin is inspiring. I am astounded by the honesty and vulnerability the Fab 5 and hero’s express, and I hope to one day be able to use whatever talents and skills I have to create positive impacts in the lives of others, too.
When my period of laziness ended, I got to work on selecting and organizing competition submissions for The Rock and Bearing News. Last year I was a junior when I did that work, and under normal circumstances this year’s juniors would have done the task instead of myself and Anna Xu. Together we split the work for selecting submissions for print and online categories. We looked at the best designs, stories, infographics, photos, art pieces, packages and more. In total we spent about four hours working on simply compiling our lists. Some of the decisions were easy, but others took a bit more time. I trust her decisions, but sometimes we’ll clash over one selection or another because of our personal opinions and tastes.
We worked on the Columbia Scholastic Press Association selections first then moved on to the National Scholastic Press Association choices. We still have another 20 days or so before we have to submit for either group, but neither of us wanted to put the work off any longer. The whole process takes about three days to complete. The first day involves selecting and listing our picks for each category. The second day is when we narrow down the submissions to what we are allowed to send in. The third day is the most frustrating, in my opinion, and is when Anna, myself and Robin Stover (our advisor) deal with labeling, captioning, organizing and sending each PDF file and website URL for judging. We probably won’t hear back about the selections for another six to eight months after we submit, by which time Anna and I will both be in college, but hearing about the various awards we’ve won will still be exciting.
While I worked for the last hour or so, my mom prepared dinner. It was more like three meals, though, because she ended up making cheeseburgers, baked beans and two pasta salads: one with shrimp and one with various vegetables. All of her food, per usual, was delicious. I could only eat so much, though, so we’ll have plenty of leftovers to munch on for the next several days. After dinner, I took a little time for myself before heading downstairs to watch Chuck with my parents. They put up with all my excited talking and cheers, which I adore them for. I have faith in humanity because of the kindness the character of Chuck Bartowski shows to his friends, family and loved ones, and my belief in true love remains intact solely because of Ellie Bartowski and Devon (Capt. Awesome) Woodcomb’s relationship. During a time of conflict like now, having a slice of happiness isn’t too much to ask for now and again. I’m glad I’ve found mine with my parents and the time we’re spending together.
“Where does a thought go when it’s forgotten?” ― Sigmund Freud
How did you spend your 80th day of social distancing? Let us know in the comments below.
