No More Regrets

November 26, 2002 by David Blackman

I feel stupid. I stayed home from Big Game to do work. Yet I've spent the day sleeping, eating and explaining the story of the Axe to my unenlightened friends on the East Coast. Many of whom go so far as to say, Well, then, its not really an axe, is it? Its just a blade. At which point I shoot lethal axe-blade-shaped mind bullets at them over the Internet. I dont feel stupid about the Axe; I feel stupid about not being at Big Game.

I have this terrible habit of passing up an opportunity knowing I'll regret it, and then regretting it. I'm too tired to go this party. I have too much work to go to Palo Alto with these friends. I'm too socially awkward to talk to these new people, too stupid to be friendly to these people, too lazy to enter this competition, too neurotic to join that club. Its not just missing these experiences that bothers me, but that I'll never be able to have them at that specific time in my life.

I know I'm still a freshman because I'm still making comparisons between high school and college. Looking back, maybe high school sucked because I refused to take advantage of the opportunities that I was presented with. So I'm here at Stanford, with my parents footing the bill for me to hang out and go to classes, and I'm trying to make a conscious effort to make the most of these four years. Its not easy. It would be so much easier to find a few friends in and around my dorm, a few CS geeks, a nice place to go biking by myself and a quiet place to do work and never venture past that narrow horizon.

I'll go home after dead week and reflect on an incredibly surreal quarter and wonder if I made the right choices. It still doesnt feel real out here to me. Maybe the shock of going home will fix that. Some days I wake up, and I cant believe eight weeks have passed or that I'm even in college. The shift from a summer of goofing off to an autumn of goofing off was so subtle that I never got a chance to register the change. Going home for the first time will remind me that college living is a bizarrely artificial construct. I wonder what the adjustment period will be like in January.

During winter break, I'll talk to my friends and swap stories. I wont have any good, first-hand, drunken party stories or any crazy football game stories. I'll end up worrying that I'll keep procrastinating my social life for four years, until I emerge into the real world and go, I didnt have enough fun, like I did on the last day of high school.

Hopefully that wont happen. I know what I want out of Stanford. At least, I think I do. I want stories to tell. I want to make sure I have stories to tell my kids about how crazy their dad was in college. (Isn't it weird that as an 18-year-old, with no desire to have kids at the moment, I worry about this stuff?) Having fun is important too; I dont want to be driving up Palm Drive in four years and wonder how I got through college without having a good time. An education? Eh, I could get that from books. I came for classes, but I'm staying for the nightlife.

In an effort to make these dreams a reality, I've adopted a new policy. Dave doesnt happen to the world, the world happens to Dave. I'm going to sit back and enjoy the ride. So far, its working. This policy finds me doing increasingly stupid and impulsive things.

I find myself trespassing in the foothills at dawn, in San Francisco seeing Rent when I know I have two papers to be doing, out on midnight runs to In-N-Out, discussing the intricacies of the secret menu and staying up until all hours of the night for no other reason than to talk to my dormmates. Its been fun, although it leads to a much more solipsistic existence. The fact that I'm exhausted to the point of feeling stoned doesnt help me come to grips with my reality either. At times my life becomes so strange and the rapid changes in scenery so jarring that I'm lead to believe none of this is really happening anywhere but in my head, and that tomorrow I'll wake up in my bed and I'll be a freshman in high school.

This policy means I never sleep (even less than the last time I bitched about it), and all my work is being done at the last minute (even closer than the last time I bitched about it). I see myself working straight through Thanksgiving (not going home, dont feel like dealing with the disorientation and jetlag of three nights back on the East Coast), followed by a dead week in which I dont sleep, followed by a finals week in which I dont sleep, and then I fly home, eat well for a week, get my wisdom teeth extracted, and then start all over again. I'm hoping going home will recharge my batteries and give me a work ethic for next quarter.

I still cant believe how fast these weeks have gone by, and by association, these columns. Its been fun. See you when I get back. Viva La College Life. Have a good dead week, good luck on finals and try not to kill your parents when they impose a curfew on you over break.

David Blackman is too tired to think of something creative to go here. Contact him at blackmad@stanford.edu.