I think I did college wrong. Other than the first two months of my first semester at Calvin, I always worked a minimum of two jobs and a maximum of four during the school year, including almost two years as the managing editor of Chimes, a very, very energy-consuming “job.” My other jobs also tended to be “academic.” Rhetoric center consultant, copy editor, and so forth. In my rare free time, I felt as if I had to be doing “academic” things to help advance my career. 

After my roommate dropped out freshman year—with no help from a video game addiction—I largely cut out such “guilty pleasures” as video games and comic books, seeing them as impediments to successful academics rather than as respite. 

The pressure to be productive is something most college students with aspirations to academia or academia-adjacent fields can relate to. We see our professors working in their offices late into the night, taking on multiple committee roles, producing public scholarship, drinking endless cups of coffee to keep their hearts beating, etc. And since the same professors are also our only models for academia, the academic work ethic becomes socialized. I felt that if I wasn’t productive enough (and, of course, there was no upper limit), I wouldn’t be a “real” academic. Playing Super Smash Bros. with my dorm floor felt counterintuitive to my “vocation.”  

The constant pressure to be productive was exhausting. I distinctly remember one Write Night where I fell asleep in the back cubicle in the Rhetoric Center, a common napping location for consultants but a messy enough space to ward off any potential clients. I made a full pot of coffee that night, and other than a cup or two that a coworker had downed, I drank the whole pot. Two hours later I was deep enough asleep that the hourly prize announcements and the brouhaha that accompanied them did nothing to wake me.

I know I’m not the only student who has felt this pressure. Like many students, after finals week I could expect my semesterly flu/cold attack. For me, the sickness took the form of a sore throat and a light cough—in addition to general fatigue, of course. All eight of my Calvin semesters ended with a sickness of some sort, something my mother, a registered nurse, always assured me was stressed-induced.

During the pandemic, I’ve spent a lot more time online, especially on the pitiful website that is Twitter, and I’ve had an all-too-late realization: it’s bullshit. 

I bring up Twitter because two accounts helped frustrate this facade. The first, Calvin’s own James K. A. Smith, a philosopher whose work has left an indelible mark in my life, unapologetically tweeted periodically through the summer about playing an e-racing game. The indulgent consumption of simple entertainment, such as playing Hearthstone or binging Star Trek, isn’t antithetical to academia; it’s just part of being human. 

The other user is Anne M. Carpenter, a theology professor at Saint Mary’s College of California. Her username, @catholickungfu, is essentially representative of her presence on the website, easily weaving between Hans Urs von Balthasar and popular media like the fantasy comic Monstress or Hellboy. Sure, she occasionally ties her theological interests with the media she consumes, but sometimes it’s just cool to look at panels of Hellboy punching some Nazis and that’s that. 

I guess what I’m saying is that productivity isn’t everything. In the words of Martin Scorsese, “whereas before I thought you’re sitting there doing nothing … well, no … you’re existing. That’s one thing [as he gives a silly grin].” After all, to be a “real” academic, or a real whatever, you just need to provide contributions to said field.

Joshua Polanski

Joshua Polanski (’20) is a freelance film and culture writer who writes regularly for the Boston Hassle and has contributed to the Bay Area Reporter, In Review Online, and Off Screen amongst other places. His interests include the technical elements of filmmaking and exhibition, slow and digital cinemas, cinematic sexuality, as well as Eastern and Northern European, East Asian, and Middle Eastern film.