The Days Are Just Packed

“Just found out that I’ll be spending the summer in Istanbul!”

“Headed to Barcelona this summer!”

“Bye-bye US, and hello France! Accepted into a summer program today!”

So begins many a recent Facebook status, reflecting (appropriately) the excitement of those lucky few given spots in study abroad programs for the summer. Understandably, these animated posts garner almost unparalleled support from the online community, sending them to the top of friends’ newsfeeds for their viewing pleasure. Fittingly, the happy cycle of “liking” and “commenting” continues without hindrance, until, of course, the post reaches someone less enthused by the vocalized success.

Invariably, acceptances come tandem with rejections—often, even, the balance tips in favor of the latter. This fact is one that we, especially, should be keenly aware of. All’s well and good with a post about a memorable summer to come, but it’s certainly read differently by someone denied the same opportunity. Delight for a friend is sometimes, sadly, overcome by a sense of failure. But why that feeling of underachievement?

The issue, in the context of our summers, reaches far deeper than a mere tension between acceptance and rejection. By publishing acceptances so prominently on social media, we perpetuate the myth that the only route to a successful summer is through an expensive, intensive program in a foreign country. It would seem that the notion of having “just a summer job, at home” has been stigmatized to the point of irreconcilable inferiority, lacking in all respects to an internship or slate of classes, domestic or international.

This is neither the case nor an acceptable course to maintain.

An email from the Office of Career Services last week sported the heading “Summer: It’s Not Too Late to Plan.” It is a point that even I, apparent denouncer of all things experiential and fun, agree with wholeheartedly. I’ve watched my friends, roommates, and self struggle to find and organize the “perfect” summer, one that invariably includes weeks (if not months) of exhaustive activity, all while feeling the pressures of those warm months fast approaching. When we plan ahead, we relieve the stress of uncertainty. If those plans spare us no moment of rest, though, are we really doing our future selves a favor?

Dean of Freshmen Thomas A. Dingman ’67 noted the value of a simple summer in an address during Freshman Parents’ Weekend, explaining that time at home for a few months might in fact be time best spent. On campus, literature detailing the benefits of rest and relaxation is prolific—why shouldn’t the same logic apply to our lives away from the yard? The idea that a heavily programmed summer is stimulating, intellectually and otherwise, is well-founded in truth, but the widely internalized view that a looser one is not is simply false.

Here, reminders that we should be “finding our passion” and “carpe diem-ing” come almost ad nauseam and serve not to inspire, but to discourage. When students see or hear an achievement voiced, they might easily make a mental leap to inferiority should their plans not be of similar extravagance. It’s no shortcoming of theirs to feel disappointed; it’s not that they can’t share in their friends’ joy, which they most certainly can, and do. Rather, it’s a factor of the above described myth, that one’s drive for achievement, for a better-rounded self, for a fulfilling life to come, is somehow compromised if they momentarily “stop driving.”

Through social media, many of us broadcast—intentionally or not—that a summer spent at home is nothing more than an undesirable pit stop, a void that will undoubtedly prove to undermine our intellectual intentions. This description might seem extreme, but I don’t think it’s unreasonable. Nine to five has been replaced by June to July, 24/7. Weekend trips with old friends have been overshadowed by summer-long expeditions to make new ones. Not to suggest that this is somehow wrong, or worse—who wouldn’t go to Paris if they had the chance? But time to recoup at home, though less glamorous, is invaluable.

Often, our minds lead us to the conclusion that, having been exposed to the real world at college, we’ll be bored to distraction at home, a place lacking in culture, stimuli, and opportunities to grow. To quote the old adage, “The grass always seems greener on the other side.” But making something out of a supposed nothing and filling a summer with experiences generated solely from one’s own impetus and hard-earned funds is a skill as practical as any. We usually find that we can’t, in fact, do all that we set out to, even with months of time. Those familiar with Bill Watterson can certainly understand my sentiment: I’ll be spending my summer at home with Hobbes, thinking, “The days are just packed.”

Jacob C. Barton ’17, a Crimson editorial writer, lives in Holworthy Hall.