A Saturday Thrill

A Saturday Thrill

(This is a follow-up to my other blog “Snoopy’s in the Loop” )

~That Saturday I learned that wearing a leader’s hat is simply not for the faint of heart. Why haven’t any wise person warned me?~... 

     “I’m not cut out for this, I should just go with whatever the group comes up with” I mumbled to myself as I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling. I tilt my head to the side and looked at my clock; I beat my alarm by 35 minutes, but I felt no urge to close my eyes and doze off for another half an hour. My anxiety level was just too high for me to go back to sleep. The thought of lassoing the members of my group and drag them to follow my concept for the project was too stimulating, too much nervous electricity was streaming through my body; I could not rest. That kept me up at night, made me wake earlier and yet kept me tarred to my bed. And just when I was trying to figure out how I could possibly freeze time and not having to deal with this group situation until a decade or so after, my alarm went off and made fun of my nonsensical dream. It buzzed and rang very loudly [hehe! It’s time lazy, wake up spineless bastard]- I have seen people slam their clocks across walls in movies and at that particular time I felt the need to do just the same with mine. However, I couldn’t make up my mind which wall I wanted to scuff, so I spared myself the trouble and gently tap the clock and it went silent.

     It was presentation day for our individual projects and right after that we were to huddle with our peers and work on the coming group assignment, or in my case- assailment. Surprisingly, I only felt nervous about the prospect of imposing myself as the “leader” or the “here’s my idea, you all should eat it” to my team members. Anyways, I roll off my bed, took a shower and dressed fancily since it was required that we wear business casual attire for the occasion; and yeah, I call that fancy because any other day I would have showed up in class like I’ve just been chewed and spitted it out. “Gosh” I said as I checked myself in the mirror “so much for a reminder that I’m a leader”. I really looked like a professional or an iron-fist leader one would agree. However, I didn’t need that confidence, so I tricked myself into thinking that I looked more like a wobbly-footed waiter. After I contemplated my reflection for what seemed like hours I let out a deep sigh –the sooner I get these things done the sooner I slip off these clothes-

    On my way to class, I realized that I had left a piece of paper I had sketched some notes that I intended to use during my presentation at home and I didn’t have much time to go and retrieve it. I wouldn’t dare to either, the teacher made it clear any latecomer will be the next to present, I didn’t want that stress; I already had plenty. I started to freak out, and as I’m driving, I try to remember some of the stuff I had written down “Hi all…No! No!  Hello everyone today I’m going to tell you …. No! Hello, I’m snoopy and today I’m going...” It was total chaos in my head, and I began to panic for real; I didn’t feel I was prepared enough for the presentation and I wasn’t ready to sell my idea to the group, and these clothes felt uncomfortably stiff on me.

     “Come in, Snoopy the door is open” said my teacher with the cheeriest smile as I sheepishly peeked through the door. “I know it’s open but no thanks for your help teacher who doesn’t have to present anything today—don’t you smile at me, you’re probably going to crucify me with a bad score on my presentation later- I know the damn door is open” of course I didn’t tell her that. I found a seat in the back and sat down; unzip my backpack, pulled out a hard copy of my business plan with minimal noise because I didn’t want to draw the teacher’s attention to me, like had she heard me she would have said “ Ah! Look who we have here! Snoopy, I see you’re pulling out your plan already, you should present first!” .The classroom looked eerie and the dozen of empty seats seems as nervous as I was. It was the quiet before the storm, yeah; it felt like something terrible was in store. Everyone – the teacher, myself and the 5 others students that were present- were silent. One student looked so scared I could see tears welling up her eyes, another  bowed and kept his eyes closed summoning all kind of angels to spare him of what’s about to happen. I continued to scan the room, this one was texting, maybe begging his father to come and rescue him “dad, I’m scared, why did I sign up for this class!” I don’t know he just looked nervous typing whatever it was. It was so satisfying to know that I wasn’t the only one freaking out. 15 minutes had passed when one member of my group sneaked into the room I tried to catch her eyes, but she wiped out her cell from her purse and engaged in a texting ecstasy, she had no worry lines on her face and she didn’t look like she had done any research for our project either.

     “Ok, there will be no presentation today”, I was so dazzled upon hearing those words that I didn’t know where they came from exactly. But nobody around me looked sparkly so I know I wasn’t dreaming. I let out a “Huh?”And I heard it again, it was the teacher “there will be no presentation today”, I tried not to look excited and she took it that I was disappointed and she added “Sorry, I know you guys put in a lot of effort into this, but there’s just not enough of us here today- under no circumstances will ever extend a presentation date again- you all looked great by the way”.  I felt like I went to heaven and came back, my rib cage shivered in exhilaration. I put away my plan paper I was supposed to be reading in preparation for the presentation and sighed deeply, this time I was thinking – I’m happy.

     At about 40 minutes into the class, another member of my group showed up, she found herself a seat and settled down. Our eyes met and she waved and in a hushed tone asked me:”hey, the presentations…what happened?” She was surprised to find the teacher lecturing instead of us taking turn behind the podium. I was more than happy to tell her “not today, it’s postponed”, needless to say how psyched she was after hearing that. The teacher announced a quiz out of the blue, and the students looked stupefied by it; I on the other hand, wasn’t. I‘d rather take everyone’s quizzes than to present. I breezed through the quiz in a flash. At about 1 hour left before class is dismissed, the teacher again, made an announcement that I totally forgot about, she had unleashed the “storm”: “I hope you guys had a chance to meet with your peers during the week, we will devote the next hour for you to work on your group projects”

The moment I dreaded the most had finally arrived.

Will the plan that I painstakingly worked on be accepted? Did anyone else in my group come up with something? Was everyone in my group present?

~Snoopyboy

Thanks for reading, thanks for your times.

Peace!

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