If one more gloating third year looks at me sadly, sighs and says: ‘I just feel so bad for you’, or ‘You’re so brave going into halls this year’, or ‘It just must be so weird for you’, I am going to explode. With my mask on.
What poor sods we must be. Stuck in our rooms. Not out being debauched legends like you were in your first year. We get it.
We may not have met loads of new people, granted. Or gotten a sense of our new area. Or stepped foot inside our university campus. Or met our teachers. Or the people on our course. Or had any human contact at all. But let me tell you about some of the perks. Yes, there are perks.
While you were getting ready for your big night out, we learnt whether we preferred our books chronologically, alphabetically, dewey decimally, size-wisely, or colour-coded-ly organised.
While you were getting off with nine random people a night, we developed trusting, steadfast relationships with the security guards who brought us our food. They despise us.
While you were on the Kate Moss diet, we gained nine and a half stone using the £280 Uber Eats voucher for isolation.
While you were struggling to hand in your first assignment, we joined four hundred and twenty-three different societies and wrote eighty-four satirical pieces for five different student magazines (publication status pending).
While you were staggering back at 5am laughing with all your new friends about the night’s antics, we were up after a full eight hours sleep to hear the shipping forecast.
While you were meeting your teachers in real life, we learnt about the intricacies of their living room wall. We have also been able to gauge which ones are worth our time and which ones are fakers by the number of books they have in shot.
So, before you go boasting about the benefits of your ‘gorgeous’ shared flat in Holloway, just remember that I’m not the one writing a dissertation this year.
This appeared in Issue 74