Our Misery Doesn't Even Compare

At Harvard, January is high season for everyone's favorite pastime, bitching and moaning. In the dining halls, on the streets, and in our common rooms, whining, complaining and lamenting proceed at a full gallop. Not only do we suffer under the burden of exams and term papers, but these winter months seem prime time for the onset of existential malaise. One friend suggested to me that The Crimson run a headline announcing, "Hell Freezes Over," in the aftermath of last week's ice storm, which left dismal Cambridge ensconced in slippery crystal.

I am certainly not immune to the gray cloud of misery that has descended onto our little hamlet. I, too, have found myself in the doldrums during the past few days, and after one particularly jarring personal calamity I even tried to seek the aide of a good old fashioned shrink. I went ahead and called University Mental Health Services only to be told by the not-so-nice receptionist that their earliest appointment wasn't for another week. How's that for rapid response? If you're ever on the brink, you only have to teeter for seven days before a University professional comes to your aid.

But here I come dangerously close to becoming just one more plaintive voice in the cacophony of reading period dismay. Rather, we should all try to put our troubles in the back of our minds, and face life with--if not a smile and a wink--at least a silent stoicism. Towards that end, we need only look to the oft-neglected outside world for ever-present reminder that things could certainly be a whole lot worse.

For instance, you could be Boris Yeltsin. On Monday, he checked into a hospital for the umpteenth time this year, this time for a bleeding ulcer. I needn't convince anyone that having a whole in one's stomach can go a long way to dampering one's day. Add to his obvious physical distress the awareness that his country is falling into shambles, and you've probably got one sorry spirit.

Of course, Yeltsin is just one man. If he's having a tough time of it, just imagine the Russian people. Many are unemployed, starving and really cold. Here at Harvard, at least we can count on dining services to keep us well nourished.

If the plight of the Russians doesn't tweak your heart strings, how about the Albanian Kosovans. The Serb's have renewed their project of ethnic cleansing in that region, ejecting the chief U.S. peace-verifier, massacring at least one village and commencing the artillery bombardment of others.

The international community has responded with the requisite dose of public protestations, but you can be sure that the average Kosovan isn't holding their breath waiting for NATO warplanes to come to their rescue.

Not all the world's trouble is overseas. In Michigan, the youth of America have once again shown their great promise. Three teenage boys took a 15-year-old girl to an apartment complex where they served her alcohol laced with a heavy sedative known as a popular date-rape drug. She died Sunday.

In my hometown of Tucson, Ariz., three employees of the local Pizza Hut where shot to death for no apparent reason as they closed up the store. Their bodies were discovered by the fiancé of 20-year-old Melissa L. Monitz, one of the victims. He was so inconsolable he could hardly deliver a statement to the police.

Admittedly, even if we genuinely attempted to empathize with all the significant suffering that exists outside our ivory tower, it probably wouldn't help us feel all that much better. Perspective is important--indeed necessary--but all pain is relative. Every January this campus becomes a crucible of stress and anxiety. For those who have trouble coping, the health travails of the Russian premiere are understandably little solace. And yet, sometimes, one of the best ways to hunker down is to derive at least some small, sick and twisted satisfaction in the fact that someone has it worse than you.

I realize that this is probably poor advice. But this sort of awful, misguided, pop-psychology is all you get when the wait to see a professional is a full week long. Perhaps, someone at University Hall should take note. In the meantime, good luck folks--on exams, papers, theses, navigating the ice and discovering the meaning of life. If things don't work out precisely as planned, remember, transcendental bliss is only a Scorpion Bowl away. Noah D. Oppenheim '00 is a social studies concentrator in Adams House.