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Page 33 text:
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“Trouble springs from Idleness, and grievous Toil from needless Ease.” Poor Richard The all-nighter, an institution prevalent at most colleges not because of the extremely heavy work load, but rather the unusual study habits of many students, is an unavoidable aspect of Harvard life. It's like sex here; everybody does it sometime. An all-nighter, however, though conceived in sweet indolence, is for many a distinctly unpleasant experience, a bastard child of sloth, born in the pain of unwanted labor. The all-nighter can be divided fairly logically into four segments: the 2-7 PM stall, the 7-11 PM attempt, the 11 PM-1 AM forgetting, and the 1-7 AM blur. The first of these segments, the stall, is characterized by the sublime wasting of time before the indistinct spectre of some future unpleasant task. After lunch a typical all-nighter, candidate returns to his room picking the corn from his teeth. He lights a cigarette, opens a window, and sits down to read the Crimson. Perhaps he puts a Buddy Holly record on the stereo and simply settles back to digest. Perhaps he wanders over to see the guys next door or to browse in heavy silence through their crinkled Playboy’s. At any rate he wastes his time with an unusual relish due to the fact that he knows he has at least six hours of work ahead of him, and he wants to make every free moment count. He is facing an impending ordeal, and he may daydream. He thinks of his girl back home, or maybe his girl here at school. He calls her up if it's convenient, and writes a letter to her (two drafts) if it is not. Sealing up the envelope, he looks at his watch. It's 3:30; just time enough for a quick game of squash, ping-pong, frisbee, cards, handball, or touch football. There's no panic yet, just time for a lot of good fun with the guys. There will be plenty of opportunity later to do whatever studying that has to be done. Later, our hero, heralded by raucus laughter, returns to his room flushed with the effects of his recent activity. If he has been exerting himself physically, he takes a shower (one of those 30-minute lukc-warm showers) and emerges refreshed, relaxed, relieved. Promptly at 6 o'clock he goes to supper, lingering like a death-house convict over his cup of coffee and three pieces of chocolate cake. It is 7 PM; he has effectively blown the afternoon. Time is crawling away and our potential all-nighter victim begins to feel a little anxious. He has run out of things with which to waste his energy. He feels he must go to the library and make an attempt. With notebooks, books, pens, pencils, life-savers, and cigarettes, our hero trundles off libe-bound. He is now relaxed for the first time since lunch; he is making an effort. His conscience is salved. As soon as he reaches the library, however, frustration overtakes him. He cannot concentrate; he fidgets in his chair; he takes four or five trips to the drinking fountain (necessitating an equal number of study breaks in the john). If Hilles is his domain, he aimlessly wanders the halls in cautious but desperate inspection of crossed legs and short skirts. In the end, though, his nervous forays are in vain. Predictably, he succumbs, and cradling a dish of ice cream, props himself against the wall like everyone else. If in Lamont, he spends countless hours counting subway trains (1st floor), reading old Life magazines (2nd floor), reading Henry Miller (3rd floor), watching Cliffies on the 3rd floor (4th floor), watching the flashing sign at the Hong Kong restaurant (5th floor). In Widner, secure in the fact he will be awakened at 10:00, he falls asleep. At 11 PM, or thereabouts, he gives up the attempt, resigned to a night of study as he sheepishly checks his books at the door. Faced now with a grisly prospect, our subject wants to put off the actual labor as much as possible. He may take another shower (this time, only 20 minutes), watch the Johnny Carson monologue, visit the guys next door. Usually he begins to banter feverishly with his roommates, trying to start an argument, and the resulting bull sessions stagger illogically far into the night. The room resounds with polemics concerning sex, religion, 3nd the nature of the universe as the spectre of six hours of future toil is clouded behind bad grammar and non sequiturs. Our hero is forgetting. Slowly all his roommates slip away to bed and our all-nighter candidate becomes an all-nighter participant. Now he has to get the work done, concentration is forced upon him, and he labors into the night. People who frequently, if reluctantly, participate in a-n er's say that the hours between 3 and 5 AM are the toughest. One becomes conscious of a slow heat creeping up over the back of the shoulders, the body exists in a state of semi-sweat, eyelids become swollen, the hands feel puffy, a growing heaviness smothers the chest . . . blur has set in. 29
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Page 34 text:
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Cartoons by Rick Deutsch It is 3:30 AM; our hero is trying to fight fatigue. He takes No-Doze, dexedrine, or gulps cup after cup of acid-black coffee. If he is typing, he begins to spell out each word, letter-by-letter, as he types it. He makes mistakes. Through his stupor he erases mechanically, paying homage to catatonia. He plods on while everything becomes a blur under the glare of his high-intensity lamp. Fighting a complete breakdown, he may take another shower (this time, short and cold). Returning to work, he frequently stares out the window for the first signs of dawn. The ticking of his watch propped up on the desk becomes louder as he calculates whether or not he will finish his tasks before the imminent deadline. Dawn renders remarkable changes; it washes away depression, heightens perception, and the “blur begins to fade. The jets start taking off from Logan again, and our hero is cheered on by the sight of people rushing to work below his window. His body is fooled by the sight of the sun; it believes, as usual, it has rested the night before, and fatigue lessens. If he has time, our all-nighter veteran plods light-headedly down to a breakfast which he will not really taste. His eyes feel a little twinge as he tries to focus on the Crimson. His face twitches, and his body subtly submits him a constant stream of neural lies. Leaving the dining hall, our veteran is elated. He recalls the events of the previous night and afternoon. He feels proud that he worked through the night, and he is quick to inform anyone of the fact. In the happy bustle of mid-morning, he completes his tasks with aching back muscles and takes his exam, hands in his paper, or recites slurringly before his history and lit. tutor. Returning to his room later, he sinks into a chair, still elated. He will remain so until fatigue overtakes him sometime in the afternoon, and his all-nighter, which began in fevered inactivity, ends in fevered sleep. — John Larouche It's 3:30; just time enough lor a quick game of squash, ping-pong, Irisbee, cards, handball, or touch iootball.
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