This time of year, for four years of my life, meant one thing and one thing only. Finals. To me, this was the down side to college. The last week of classes was usually the week I’d have to get all my projects and presentations done, and of course the next week, all tests. I remember many nights thinking, “I just need to get through the next two weeks! Then all this torture will be over!”

I kind of did it to myself, because I would save it all for those two weeks, thinking I’d have plenty of time to get it all done, and then, the night before it was all due, wonder how I would manage to do it all. But it wasn’t always my fault, as we know the cardinal rule of college is, every professor thinks theirs is your only class.

I pulled many an all nighter during that time. I’d sit upstairs at the one computer my family owned, with the dial-up internet and Windows 3.1, writing paper after paper, presentation after presentation, take-home final after take-home final.

I’d muddle through the weeks we knew as crunch time and, finally, somewhere around the first day of winter, it would all be over. And then I’d promptly catch a cold. Like clockwork. For four straight years I was sick for Christmas.

The one thing I take with me is the band that got me through said time of torture — Jars of Clay. I think everyone remembers one song from them, the perennial favorite and Adrian Belew-produced “Flood”. I loved all their stuff, though. Jars was the perfect soundtrack to 3am term papers for my Human Condition class.

The below song, “Frail”, with its soft, calm melody and almost hypnotic acoustic guitar, got me through many, many mid-December nights. And some late April ones too.