On March 16, 2020, a state-wide stay at home order was issued by the governor of Pennsylvania. This was due to increasing concerns regarding the spread of COVID-19. Up until this point, Grove City College had remained open, but sadly, this order finally forced the Grove to shut its doors and move to online classes. However, some students could not go home for one reason or another. The 30 or so of us that remained on campus nicknamed ourselves The Remnant. Our numbers hailed from all over the world, from Australia to Jamaica, and in my case, Hawaii. During my time with The Remnant, I journaled about what my life was like on campus.
When we last left off, I was far ahead of schedule on a big project, and therefore had little homework for the week.
March 25, 2020
I’m technically writing this on the 26th but that has no bearing on the fact that today with one exception was entirely uneventful. I got up, did class, got lunch, did class again. The one exception was for dinner. Myself and several of The Remnant got food to go and had a picnic on one of the patios next to the quad. It was an absolutely gorgeous day out. We used our time at dinner to lay plans for playing volleyball tomorrow (technically today given my procrastination). It’ll be nice to have a reason to get outside in the beautiful weather again tomorrow. Because I’m so far ahead in video production I didn’t need to do any homework for tomorrow. Naturally, I blew all this free time on video games rather than my upcoming paper. I saw a very interesting YouTube video once describing the thought process of a procrastinator. It illustrated two primary companions to the mind of the procrastinator, the instant gratification monkey, and the panic monster. Clearly one of these companions is still in hiding. -Jacob
A common demon faced by many college students is that of procrastination. It is something nearly everyone has to deal with and overcome, but it seems to target me in particular. However, I have learned to develop a workflow around it. I have managed to time the arrival of my panic monster such that I have not needed to pull any all-nighters thus far in my college career. However I am still working on scheduling myself in such a way as to not deal with the panic monster at all. Either way, I recommend that any incoming student to the Grove get their instant gratification monkey in check before arriving, as it will make your transition to college life much smoother than it might otherwise be.
Stay tuned for further installments of The Remnant!
