Elizabeth B. asks, “How does one find love in the ZSR library?”
Dear Elizabeth,
It’s that time of year again: students stretch out on blankets across the quad, our classrooms are a chorus of coughs louder than any infirmary ward and as John Paul Young sang in his 1977 Australian disco hit, love is in the air. Yes, Valentine’s Day is fast approaching and you can almost smell the anxiety wafting from young couples across campus: how many roses are too many roses? Is the Shorty’s Old Gold an acceptable dinner date meal? Is it a faux pas if I buy a mariachi band to serenade Jenna during her Spanish test?
Of course, mid-February marks not only the season of love, but also our shared season of academic suffering: midterms are approaching faster than Lebron James’ hairline is receding and professors are piling on work like they know an asteroid is going to hit North Carolina before the semester’s end (similar to the plot of the 2013 Australian hit film These Final Hours).
The point is, if you’re feeling loveless on Feb. 14, never fear: ZSR is here to save you. Indeed, Elizabeth, I must convert your question into a statement — in ZSR, you don’t find love; it is love that finds you.
Picture this: you’re on the ZSR eighth floor because you’re not a filthy casual. It’s 3:14 a.m. You have an inorganic chemistry test in five hours, and you’re already past the deadline on your 10-page essay analyzing why Grendel’s mother from Beowulf is an allegory for the presidency of Donald Trump. You’re starting to hallucinate — your keyboard is swimming, your pen is levitating and the bookshelf to your left morphs into the jawline of hit Australian politician Malcolm Turnbull.
Then, Elizabeth, you feel it in your throat — a literary pick-up line coming to fruition. You release the words into the shattering silence of the eighth floor: “Hey babe, let’s honeymoon to Mt. Doom because I want you to be the Lord of My Wedding Ring.” Utter these words, and your true love is certain to materialize beside you.
Other surefire literary lines include: “Are you from the Colombian town of Macondo? Because without your love, I’ll experience ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude.’” Or, “Are you an Igbo man named Okonkwo living through disastrous effects of colonialism and toxic masculinity? Because ‘Things Fall Apart’ without you.”
If you’re looking for love, establish home base in ZSR and keep well stocked with literary pick-up lines. As for me, I remember my first Valentine’s: a spa day with my lover. It was going swimmingly until we discovered that I was allergic to cucumber facial creams when I puffed up like the balloon of an underpaid clown performing at his nephew’s eighth birthday party. I spent four days in the hospital.
Anyways, I hope this advice helps! I’m safely ensconced in the hit Australian town of Perth, and I’m certain that the FBI can’t catch me here. Email me at [email protected] to be featured in the next issue of Touching Tips! Otherwise, catch me at Outback Steakhouse.
XOXO,
Peter
