The denial phase begins where everyone begins at Duke: orientation week, better known as O-week. Nothing makes it easier to avoid confronting the gigantic life shift that is college like no work and all play for a whole week...but denial never lasts forever.
When discussing my desire for a better arts requirement, a friend disagreed, saying that the lowest grade they ever received was in an arts class. This is a fair point given the Duke obsession with perfect GPAs; however, to quote one of my Economics professors “it’s not about the grade, it’s about what you learn.”
Replace the C1 with the shooters bus. Something about strobe lights and Jack Harlow’s verse on Lil Nas X’s Industry Baby playing while you’re on the way to your surely dreaded 8:30am class just seems appropriate
With so much of our lifestyle and work being intertwined with technology, a high screen time may be hard to escape. The problem with Gen Z and technology would be better attributed to what content we consume and how we consume it during our time in front of a screen.
If the Dead is the representation of a chill, stress-free life where you take things day-by-day and have no worries about the things you cannot control, then Duke is the antithesis to this.
My friends here are all in the same boat. Due to work and extracurriculars, we see each other less and the time we do spend together is mostly spent mitigating each other’s respective mental breakdowns.
Now that my tennis days are well behind me, “put the ball in the other person’s court” is not a literal command screeched by an upset tennis coach, but a metaphorical lesson I preach to my friends like a sophomore frat boy preaches the rules of Thursday night partying to first years.
