Maximizing your ACES potential

One of my favorite distractions from doing homework is intricately planning the next few years of my life. Since freshman year, I've spent countless hours on ACES writing down every class that I want to take during my entire career at Duke. I've explored majors, minors, certificates, independent studies, leaves of absence, transferring, dropping out of school entirely and staying in Durham for a fifth year, all in the course of one night when I had a midterm paper due the next day.

The hardest part is that every option seems great in theory. A quadruple major? That would look awesome when I apply to Law/Grad/Business/Film/Journalism school. But am I actually going to be able to complete multiple majors, let alone one, when it's two in the morning and I've only finished the outline of my introduction?

The worst thing is that my roommate is the exact same way. When one of us even thinks about beginning homework, the other bursts into the room with a detailed itinerary of studying abroad in Istanbul or a printout of courses that are cross listed under English, philosophy and economics, so that means only three philosophy classes senior year instead of four. Only three philosophy classes?! That means I can take that Vietnam War class and get a minor in history and I won't have to take econ during the summer which means I can get an internship that might give me course credits so I can graduate a semester early and travel around Europe!

We get so riled up sometimes that I imagine us shouting primal chants around a bonfire. Papers fly through the air and pens scribble furiously. As the excitement reaches a fever pitch, we start to sound like a Howard Dean tirade: "Yeah, we could take that film class in the fall. oh, cool, it counts for the film certificate. and I already have TWO of the requirements already. and if we study abroad in Oxford I could make a documentary ABOUT OUR EXPERIENCES THERE... and then I can submit it to a FILM SCHOOL AFTER I GRADUATE FROM DUKE WITH HONORS. AND MOVE TO HOLLYWOOD WHERE I'LL MAKE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS AND I CAN FINALLY LEARN HOW TO SURF! BYAWWW!!!!"

The irony of the whole situation is that the time I spend preparing for the future is the time I should be spending on the present in order to have a future. In the period that I spent figuring out what grades I need in every class for the next two semesters in order to get my GPA above 3.0, I could have just been doing my homework and getting good grades the old-fashioned way. The A- that I'm planning on getting in Italian could be the key to my entire future, as my research has indicated, but it's tough when I'm using my workbook as scratch paper for the distance and travel time between Prague and Helsinki by train.

So far in my tenure at Duke, I've majored in English, religion, political science, public policy and philosophy, although some only for one night. It's impossible to stay committed to one thing when there are just so many options out there. My mind does tend to change a little too quickly sometimes. I'll tell my friends the plan I cooked up around dawn last night that would allow me to get two majors and three minors, while at the same time training for the marathon and learning karate. Most of the time they look at my crazy, bloodshot eyes and say, "Dude, there's no way you're ever going to do that." They think that they're bringing me back to reality, but all they're doing is encouraging me. "They're right!" I say to myself, and off I go to my room like a mad scientist and attempt to bring even wilder creations to life.

I guess the point is that you can lose yourself in the future very easily without realizing that you have responsibilities in the present. There's nothing wrong with having dreams or making plans, just as long as you keep your imagination in check. I mean, I have a paper for my Shakespeare class due tomorrow. I shouldn't waste my time trying to find a class for my English major that also fulfills my research requirement. Wait, there is one? Okay, this might sound crazy, but bear with me: First, I study abroad in Ghana.

Steve Brown is a Trinity junior. His column runs every other Wednesday.