An Open Letter to the Guy Who Finished His Final in 38 Minutes

Dear Guy Who Finished His Final in 38 Minutes,

Hi. You don’t know me, but I know you. In fact, I’d venture a bold guess and say that every single person in the class knows you now. I mean, students are easily distracted, and seeing you trudge up to the front of the classroom, blue book in hand, and hand over your cumulative knowledge of the class within 38 minutes of the final starting, well, suffice to say, it broke my attention. I was merely starting question number 3, but you, you had finished every single question and were officially done with the course! In fact, I wanted to have a conversation with you but I was more interested in not failing then discussing your test-taking methods. Anyway, I thought I’d write this letter in the hopes that you’ll read this and give me some closure as to what exactly happened.

I mean, come on now friend, let’s lay down a couple of givens about the situation here. You obviously couldn’t have done very well on this final. The test was meant to be taken in two hours – the fast kids started to finish around the hour and fifteen minute mark – so there’s realistically no way you could have completely answered all of the questions in the time you took. Let’s assume that you weren’t prepared for the test – missed class a lot, didn’t study, partied the night before, the whole package. Did it really only take 38 minutes for you to write down every single thing you learned in the entire class? That’s it? Certainly there are ways in which to bullshit that we all use to make our essays longer. Reword the question! Make a wild and random guess to what the answer might be! Write about your dog! Anything! I’m confident that I could answer any question in the human language and still manage a small amount of partial credit. It would take me longer then 38 minutes though.

Why 38 minutes? It’s such a random number. If you didn’t know anything, why not just write “FUCK THIS CLASS P.S. I’M GONNA GO GET LUNCH” on the bluebook and leave? That would take 38 seconds, tops. But 38 minutes – you had to have written something down. Why even come to the final in the first place? The only acceptable solution I can think of is that you walked into the wrong final, and, since you suffer from extreme shyness, needed 38 minutes to properly compose yourself before leaving altogether. We all dislike finals, but at least show them some ounce of respect there.


Sincerely,

Cody S.