When you oversleep and miss class like a moron.

So here’s the deal, ever since elementary school I have never been a morning person. I’m just not. If I have to get out of bed before noon, I am not happy.

In elementary school, you kind of get a pass for that sort of thing. The teacher usually isn’t thrilled with your tardiness, but it is what it is.

In middle school though, that shit gets real. Now, in addition to not wanting to get out of bed in general in middle school, I was also bullied, a lot. Everyday was a literal Hell on Earth. I won’t get into those details now, but that was another reason I didn’t want to get up and go. It gets better though. At one point, I had either been late, or absent from school so many times that the school threatened to call the police! I was almost given truancy tickets as a middle school student. That enough for you? Or, how about the time my sixth grade science teacher reamed me in the hallway, in front of everyone for being late to his class?

Let me go ahead and tell this story quick. So my middle school is an oddly shaped building. Half of it looks like a normal school building. The other half looks like a flying saucer half buried in the ground. The area where most of the classrooms were was a literal circle. It had two rings and a center. On the outer-most ring were normal classrooms and lockers. These rooms had little windows about nine feet off the floor to the outside which let in just the minimal amount of sunlight. Then there was the inside ring which was mostly science classrooms and more lockers–they had no windows in case you were wondering. In the center was the school library.

My sixth grade locker was located on the outer-most ring of the building. If I stood facing it, my science classroom was around the circle, almost exactly at my six o’clock. I wasn’t a short kid, but I wasn’t super tall either. And, because I was late most of the time, it took me longer to get around that damn circle to my science classroom. I can remember many mornings, running down the hall, half dropping my books and getting yelled at by other teachers to “stop running!” Yeah, I was that kid. The final bell would always ring before I got there though. If your ass wasn’t in the room and in a chair, guess what? You’re tardy.

My science teacher was a short, mean man. He yelled at everybody. One day though I pull my usual running down the hallway stunt and don’t quite make it to class in time. I get into the room about 15 seconds after the bell rings. As soon as I get in the door, dead silence. I get to my chair and I hear, “Brayden, hallway, now!” Ah shit. So I go back outside and await my public execution–and it was just that. He gets the class started on whatever we were doing that day and then comes out to the hall. I’m sweating through my t-shirt and this guy is literally 3 inches from my face. I’m pressed up against the brick wall with absolutely no hope of escape. He then proceeds to completely destroy me. Yelling and throwing back-handed insults at me. Other teachers are closing their classroom doors and shit. I can hear the science room and it’s gone quiet while all my classmates listen. He left the door open of course. He gets done chewing me out after what feels like an eternity and I make the walk of shame back to my seat and try to salvage what I can of the class through the tears.

Fast forward, I’m in college now and still haven’t learned my lesson. Now I purposefully tried to build my schedule so that I wouldn’t have any early morning classes, and I’ve been late plenty during my college career so far. Today is no exception. So on Tuesdays and Thursdays I have my first class at 11 a.m. Apparently, that’s still too early for me because both days this week, my ass has overslept. Tuesday I managed to make it somehow. Today though, not so lucky because I woke up at home at the exact time class would be starting. So here I am, sleep crust in my eyes and everything, feeling like a moron while I send my professor a half-assed email explaining why I couldn’t come to class today (I blamed the trouble I had with my car earlier in the week). I have no idea if he’ll excuse this one since I’ve used both my “free” absences doing the same shit I did today. The burden is still mine to bare and I’m still not a morning person. The only difference now is they can’t call the police on me.