Holiday season has been both hectic and fun

This is the crazy, crazy, turbulence of the busy-body lifestyle of someone fighting to do nothing tooth and nail and failing at every turn. The anxiety of “is it good enough,” when I know it can be done better. The tension spread over every measured word as I pass them with ease, lolling even. Life is ever so eventful.

To start, the semester is at its end and the holidays are here. I wish to everyone the best that they would hope for. I cannot say it was not a fight to reach this point, and if it was I cannot recall. This past month has been so busy. Not that it was bad in the slightest, it was all rather enjoyable.

The weeks since last we spoke have been filled with club activities, induction ceremonies, tests, home repair, reading, lectures, scuba diving and the ever present urge to encourage every fellow student that I connected with these past months. And still so much more is left unsaid.

I suppose one of the biggest changes about this semester was the countless hours in the math lab. A job that I was quite astounded at my taking. In all truth, I had attempted on at least four occasions to learn algebra. I had failed at every attempt until the last, and now I tutor it. It seems rather strange to me, not only is it a subject outside of my major but it has also been the single most difficult one for me to me to grasp. Yet here I am teaching it to fellow students.

Another aspect that has kept me in a hectic mess has been the ever growing list of club activities. Starting with the Rain concert in the Columbus River Center, I have not had a week without an event in over a month. From the songs of the Beatles as performed by Rain, to Darton’s Cultural-Exchange Fair, to Orlando, Fla. for the Ska is Dead IV concert, to the Phi Theta Kappa induction ceremony, to an evening of scuba diving with the Outdoor Adventure Club, to meeting with the advisers of Sigma Chi Eta — and all the while keeping pace with classes and finals. And as if it was the final mark of completion, an evening of disc golf at Chehaw after the last day of finals.

And with so much to do, I was swarmed by it all. I see it now in the blank stare that has taken over my mind this past week. As the tension unwinds, I find myself reading books, smiling at the air and laughing for no apparent reason. I love every minute of it.

Looking forward to the three-week break that precedes my final semester at Darton, I see a list of tasks that need to be handled around the house. And while I don’t revel in the toil of it, I enjoy working with my hands and the sensation of a task completed is quite fulfilling.

In the future beyond that cusp, comes scuba training and a semester of honors activities, final studies and things that I’ll be doing for my own good. I smile at the prospects.

My final note is a commendation to friends who have graduated and friends who have transferred to bigger schools. I congratulate them in their quests for bigger things and I know I am soon to follow.

Albany area native James Malphrus is a third-year student at Darton College in Albany majoring in journalism and sociology. He plans on transferring to the University of Georgia after completing his associate degree.