It's that time of the year again. Suddenly it seems as if everyone attending your university has decided to move into the library, no amount of coffee can help you stay awake long enough to get some decent study sessions in, and every single professor has sprouted horns and assigned essays on essays on essays. We trudge on and can see the light at the end of the tunnel, known more commonly as Winter Break. After taking that last final, the elephant that has been chilling on your chest for two weeks finally decides to step off, at least until next dead week. We are so close to wrapping up in a blanket by the fire place while drinking hot chocolate and catching up with family in your parents' house. However, some of the unfortunate few have arguably the greatest challenge of all time: Driving across the state to get to our hometowns. Very few situations leave us with this type of unspeakable grief. I will, nonetheless, attempt to put the five stages of driving across the state into words.
1. Denial.
The last thing we want to do is drive five or more hours to go to a place where we spend an absurdly large amount of time avoiding people from high school as if we are suddenly Vince Vaughn. As it turns out, just because you can dodge a wrench doesn’t necessarily mean you can dodge an ex in the grocery store. Simply living in denial up until five minutes before you have to leave in order to make it across the mountains before dark is nature's way of only letting in as much as we can handle.
2. Anger.
Absolutely nothing is as infuriating as complete strangers not realizing that you have a much longer drive ahead of you than they do, and they are being selfish by hogging up the left-hand lane and only going 10 over the speed limit. You begin to create a deeper understanding of Ludacris, and "Move Bitch Get Out Da Way" becomes your anthem. Suddenly, Britney Spears' meltdown of '07 suddenly seems pretty rational, and to be completely honest, a little restrained compared to what you would be doing right now if only you could escape this metal hell-hole going 80 mph on I-5.
3. Bargaining.
On a good road trip, the bargaining begins at about the halfway point. For me, I usually start reflecting on my Sunday School days about one hour in and try to remember if begging Jesus to wipe out the Honda Civic driven by the grandma in front of me in the fast lane is an inappropriate prayer request. The answer is and always will be 'yes,' so then I move on to telling the universe I will trade 100 hours of community service if I magically appear in my own bed within the next 30 seconds.
