Oxonian Anecdotes: No Picnic

Almost two months passed before I was confronted with an inevitable realization: Oxford was hard. It was pressing me and was not about to subside, regardless of tears or cursing on my part. It reminded me of that one week in every college semester when syllabi converge, piling paper upon exam upon presentation. Except this semester, that one week of trauma lasted from August to December. I’m not sure why it surprised me. Oxford University is debatably the most prestigious educational institution on earth. Why, then, when faced with an immovable, but understandable reality of difficulty, was I paralyzed by doubt and a desire to re-pack my big, red suitcase? I knew it was coming! The anxiety came to a head one particular afternoon. Up until then, I hadn’t quite been conscious of the ever-building pressure. I stared at the moving picture of my mother on the computer screen. She had given me a webcam before I left to avoid pricey phone cards.

“How are you?” she asked, in an ordinary way.

“How am I?” I repeated, preparing to answer the question as best I could. “Well, my proposal for my long essay is due this week and I hate the topic I chose. I thought it would be interesting, but I checked out eight commentaries on the book of Romans and none of them talk about Plato. I don’t know what I’m going to do. It’s too late to change it, but I don’t think it’s going to work….” My voice started to falter. “And I have my secondary tutorial this week. I feel so unprepared for this, and I know my tutor thinks I’m an idiot. I just didn’t know enough about early church doctrine when I got here and there’s nothing I can do to fix that. I’m trying as hard as I can and I just don’t think he sees that….” Silent tears began to fall over my cheeks. “And my primary tutor assigned us two Dickens novels to read this week! That’s over a thousand pages of reading, plus the essay. I just can’t do it!” I involuntarily, quickly and audibly inhaled several times, the tears quickened and the pitch of my voice became appropriate to calling a dog. “I don’t know how they expect us to do all of this,” was my final and pathetic complaint through the tears I wished I could hide.

I made an honest endeavor to compose myself before speaking again, but it was no easy task. I didn’t want her to see me like that. I was supposed to be a strong, independent, brilliant young scholar, and here I was, weeping at the thought of my workload. I was embarrassed and felt as if the entire world was watching and shaking their heads in disapproval. While I floundered in self-pity and reluctantly worked toward composure, my mother delivered an inspired motivational speech. It fell on all but deaf ears. I wanted to believe I was incapable, to feel sorry for my poor, inadequate self. That would be easier than the work that I knew lay ahead.

That was my only academically induced breakdown of the semester.[1] I cannot be certain why I was overcome at that exact moment in time, but once I came to my senses, the situation became clear. I could only do what I could do. This was the one piece of wisdom offered by my mother that I did hear, and it rang true until the end. I wiped my eyes and began to work; my tear-soaked fingers typed furiously as my face began to dry. I worked as hard as I could. Some days this looked different than others, but by the time it was actually time to re-pack my big red suitcase, I knew I had done my best and was, in fact, capable of applying myself to accomplish great things.
I know that my experience in front of the webcam will not be the last one of its kind, as my delicate ego will continue to crack when the pressure mounts, but I also know that no matter what my adversary might be, I will not be defeated for longer than it takes my tears to dry.

[1] Of course, there were other types of breakdowns: poverty-induced, insecurity-induced, homesickness-induced, inadequacy complex-induced,
but those are not to be discussed here.