I can't get in

Near Olite, in Spain, there is a ruined castle. I decide to visit the place and as I am standing there before it, a man at the door says:

‘You can’t come in.’

My intuition tells me that he is saying this for the pure pleasure of saying ‘No’. I explain that I’ve come a long way, I try offering him a tip, I try being nice, I point out that this is, after all, a ruined castle…suddenly, going into that castle has become very important to me.

‘You can’t come in,’ the man says again.

There is only one alternative: to carry on and see if he will physically prevent me from going in. I walk towards the door. He looks at me, but does nothing.

As I am leaving, two other tourists arrive and they too walk in. The old man does not try to stop them. I feel as if, thanks to my resistance, the old man has decided to stop inventing ridiculous rules. Sometimes the world asks us to fight for things we do not understand and whose significance we will never discover.

By Paulo Coelho

"Sometimes the world asks us to fight for things we do not understand, and whose significance we will never discover."

Putting things into personal contact, I feel like a seven year old dreading his first day of school - this despite going thru 15 first day of school. Each time a new school year begins, all i see is 13 weeks of school followed by the first exams. A month's break is then followed by another 13 weeks of school and thereafter, a three months break. And following that, the next new academic year begins.

Is this the part where perseverance and determination comes in? The part of the marathon where the legs begin to retire and a strong mind steps in and tells you to soldier on? It definitely seems like it.

A quick update on Facebook attracted a "Let's do this together." While it's somewhere in me to see the significance of education, and despite the fact that i acknowledge I'm 3 years away from graduation, insyaallah, a simple "Let's do this together" was a gentle reminder that I'm not alone.

In other words, one should fight till the very end and do his or her best to secure good grades in school even though its true significance is still somewhere in the distant horizon. Hope i'll keep this in mind whenever i lose sight of my objective.

May the coming academic year be filled with pleasant memories, wonderful experiences, a little bit of everything challenging and perhaps a brush with the present sweet impression, if not, the next.