Picture this:
It’s Sunday night. The sky is dispensing a layer of sleet onto the snow that now blankets the entire state. Girls on my hall are drunk and carefree, confident that classes won’t be held tomorrow.
Even though nothing is formally decided until 6:30 next morning, the snow is so stiff with ice Sunday night that you can walk across campus without leaving a single footprint. Do I play the odds and join in the fun? Risk oversleeping or showing up to class with a hangover? Some might. Hell, most did. But I just don’t work that way. I get ready for bed.
Oh, and by the way, classes were, of course, cancelled the next morning.
I hate when it snows at Guilford. I hate nights like Jan 25, when everyone in the Triad knew before they sat down to dinner whether or not they were to bother waking up the next morning …
That is, unless their job or education was in association with Guilford College. Here at Guilford, even if it snows all day and ices all night, there is still that slim possibility of an Indian summer that forces us to wait until the following morning to find out, and even then, no decision is necessarily final.
What do I mean by that last comment? Does anyone remember hurricane Isabel? We all received voicemails early in the morning to inform us that 8:30s and 9:55s were cancelled due to the danger of falling branches. I remember. I had a midterm that day at 9:55. I radiated relief. That was, of course, until I got a phone call from a friend who was in my 9:55 with me. He told me to get out of bed – that they changed their minds about canceling classes.
“Are they allowed to do that?” I asked.
“Probably not,” he said. “But they did.”
O.K., that’s just ridiculous.
Based on the swift manner in which the school informed the public that classes would resume on Jan. 27, it is clear that Guilford is not incapable of being logical. If the weather forecaster says on the 11 o’clock news that there is a chance of a “wintry mix” in the morning, am I suggesting that the next day’s classes be cancelled immediately?
Of course not. But if the simple act of taking out your garbage strikes you as risky and every other establishment in the triad has cancelled classes and services for the next day, then try and apply some common sense to the situation.
Utilize that gut instinct, Guilford. College students weren’t meant to hate the snow.