I was walking back from an IM basketball game Sunday, creating a mental list of what I needed to do for the week. Between classes, The Collegian and other commitments, I had a brief “blue screen” moment, like the way a computer flashes to that blue screen of exposed code when it hasn’t the slightest idea how to handle itself. Then a took a deep breath, resigned myself to a week reliant on coffee and late nights, and realized I would be ok.

An informal survey revealed I’m not alone in this. The few weeks before spring break get chaotic. Assignments flow in, our minds drift to that fantastic week off and productivity slowly diminishes. Not to mention the sub-zero temperatures, the towering piles of snow, treacherous ice patches and enough salt on campus walkways to cure every fish in the Atlantic.  It is overwhelming. It is all going to be ok.

First, there are, at the time of publishing, eight days left before spring break. Eight. Convert your metaphorical sleep bank from debit to credit, and assume you will get some extra sleep over spring break. You probably will be able to and, if not, in the tradition of “How I Met Your Mother,” that’s a problem for future you. 

Of course, sleep as much as you can, and maintain your sleep schedule, and keep up your exercise plan and your standard diet and all the solid advice that goes into finals week, or any other stressful time. But also know if you don’t, it is only eight days.

Second, in the tradition of “High School Musical,” we are all in this together. When your face hurts from the cold, your roommate feels the pain too. When a pant leg rises slightly, revealing the brightest shade of pasty white skin in the visible color spectrum, know the rest of the room is right with you. When you stare at the coffee pot, questioning why the coffee is gone like Captain Jack Sparrow searching for his rum, know you can get in line at Eagles’ Nest for yet another cup, standing alongside another caffeine-deprived zombie in need of some Starbucks. 

Papers, projects, presentations and general assignments flood this time of year. While I won’t say anything foolish like, “C’s get degrees.” I will say less stress is best. If that means not worrying too much about the grade, so be it. Make sure you get something out of the work (after all, you paid a hefty sum for the privilege of writing that eight-10 page paper), and let the grade come naturally as an after thought.

Third, and perhaps most importantly, I’ve realized this is a cyclical situation. I wrote a column about being overwhelmed by stress this time last year, and I’m sure I will be overwhelmed at this time next year. Living in a world where proper plans can make for a stress-free school year is a fantasy. Throughout the year, we all have easy times, like the first few weeks of the semester. We also have some clichéd tough times, like finals week. These few weeks leading up to spring break seem to sneak up on us, until we are suddenly up to our frost-nipped ears in school work. 

Maybe proper planning can avoid this; I wouldn’t know, as I’ve lived the life of a procrastinator my entire life. I accept late nights doing work I could’ve done days earlier. I willingly trade eight hours of restful sleep for that “pointless” conversations about which NFL players would win a WWE-style Royal Rumble. 

This gets me to my last point: we are in college right now. College, that time where all of these insane and bizarre things are completely acceptable. We ask to be treated as adults, and we wear pajama pants for entire days in public. We have the responsibilities of the vote and the draft, yet we largely defer the responsibility of feeding ourselves to a cafeteria. We only have a few hours of mandated class time, yet we somehow never have enough time to do everything we want to do. 

Think about that – there’s actually so many things on a tiny college campus in middle-of-nowhere Ashland, Ohio, that we can’t fit it in our day. That’s an amazing thing, and it is the thing I have to focus myself on when I’m bogged down under two papers and a newspaper and everything else I’m responsible for. We are in the midst of some of the busiest times in our lives, when we have the ability to bounce from activity to class to our job to a bar and to do it all again.

Of course, most of that isn’t happening for these next eight days. These next eight days are the vegetables to the dessert, the practice to the big game. Fight through, get to break, and return to campus alive and ready to enjoy college as best as we can.