A Plea For Silence

College.

A time in our lives where we are given our first taste of independence and living away from our parents. Where we can sleep until 4 pm or later. Where no one is nagging you, or telling you to turn your music down, and where a midnight In-N-Out dinner trek is no uncommon venture. It’s the last time where we get to be utterly and completely immature if we want before graduating into the responsible “adult world”, and there’s no one there to stop us. Oh, college. There’s nothing in the world quite like it. It’s a learning experience, and an important one at that; filled with new and unexpected challenges at every turn.

And as is such, please allow me to dive further into one of my aforementioned topics: sleep. Also known as a blissful, unconscious, recuperation time, it is a beloved and necessary component of a college student’s life. We treasure and need our sleep time in a manner similar to that of Lindsay Lohan’s apparent need for illicit substances, smeared eye-makeup, and trashy publicity. Often, and I’m sure Lindsay can attest to this, when something gets in the way of a thing we so deeply cherish and love, people can become, well, perturbed and irritated.

Case in point: freshman year dorm life. I laugh, I cry, and I walk into my room to find people trying on my clothes. In a space where hundreds and hundreds of freshman are crammed into less than a square mile, all living on top of each other and with no air conditioning, more than just last week’s cup o’ noodles can get old. For with no air conditioning, one’s windows must be left open to ensure proper coolness and ventilation, and when everyone’s windows are left open and facing a small yet well maintained courtyard, things can get noisy.

But who said it was a bad noise? After all, there is a certain peace one gets while trying to sleep and hearing someone sing along at an eardrum-shattering volume to Ashlee Simpson’s hit single that was annoying 3 years ago and hasn’t gotten any better. In fact, who wouldn’t want to read Two Treatises of Government while the suite below you was playing Super Smash Brothers with the Bose surround sound system your parents got you as a graduation gift? You don’t know a good night’s sleep before a midterm until you have experienced drifting off to dream-land at the sound of a hearty drunken game of spin-the-bottle in the room next door. Screaming and yelling from across the courtyard, coupled with all sorts of intermingled curses and derogatory jargon, can really relax the mind. And what better sound to wake up to than that of the jackhammers working on the refurbishing of the Student Health Center? Who said it was bad noise, indeed?

I DID.

For the love of all that is holy or even remotely religiously affiliated on this Earth, I am pleading for the residents of Middle Earth to respect the Quiet Hours, which I will remind you go from 10 pm to 8 am on school nights. Next time you want to recreate a scene from Battle Royale in the lady’s room, or get everyone together for some post-marijuana-use RAMEN FEST, please desist.

TO THOSE REPEAT OFFENDERS:A person ten-feet away from you, merely separated by the thin (yet oddly durable) walls that shelter our obstinate brains, may very well be stressing out, cramming, or trying to get a good night’s sleep before a test the next day. They need quiet. They need peace. They need peace and quiet. So stop to consider next time you think it would be a good idea to cause a raucous by hitting your best friend with a sock full of batteries, because the studious shouldn’t have to drag themselves off to the middle of Aldrich Park to get their work done. One shouldn’t, after all, be forced to call Duty Line sixteen times in a single night. I don’t wish to prevent you from partaking in the joys of your (relatively) responsibility-free freshman year, but please have the decency to respect those who value their GPA.

Thank you for your consideration.