Even when the Sunday sun glistens and the crisp fall wind beckons a potential afternoon spent outside, many Tufts students still find the day the most dreary, depressing one of the week. Looming papers, midterms and problem sets win over the beauty of nature, and it's off to the basement of Tisch for a day dealt to diligence.
But students who think that Sunday is simply a day to play catch-up, however, may be missing out on the untapped potential of this forgotten weekend day.
Sophomore Austin Lines is one of a growing group of Tufts students who refuse to allow Sundays to be swallowed by the impending doom of Monday. Lines set out on a spontaneous journey to New York last Sunday, where he and three friends climbed a mountain, discovered a cave, dipped in a waterfall and stumbled upon a garage sale where he purchased a cleaver for only $1.50 before returning to Boston to begin preparing for a math exam.
"Sunday needs to be treated with the same amount of adventure and debauchery as Saturday," Lines said. "I like to go climbing on Sundays. Hopefully in the winter I will get to go ice climbing."
While Lines expounds the exciting possibilities of Sundays, others appreciate the latter half of the weekend as a much-deserved day of rest and relaxation. Junior Xin Cao dubs Sunday his "lounging around [and] studying day," but admits that it most often becomes a "slack-off day," particularly during NFL season.
Junior Lisa Tse also likes to take it slow on Sunday mornings. "The best way to wake up is Sunday morning brunch at the Danish Pastry House with my housemates," Tse said. "There's no better way to catch up on life and on the night before."
The ways Tufts students make Sundays more fun range from romantic dinners to disco dance classes to Russian tea tastings, but the general trend is taking one or more hours to brush academics aside and blow off some sick-of-studying steam.
For sophomore Patricia Pop, Sundays are both a blessing and a curse. "For college students, it's your last grasp of the glorious weekend time, but it's usually inundated with procrastinated projects," Pop said.
To deal with the stress and lighten her load, Pop has filled her Sunday nights with a few activities that force her to "crawl out of the depths of the library." Six to seven is Belly Dance, seven to eight is dinner with fellow Wilderness support staffers and nine to 10 is Tufts Dance Collective.
"The point is to let loose, not overstress myself even more. No matter what's going on in my life -- especially on hectic Sundays -- I break it up with an hour or two of 'forced fun'" Pop said.
The 30-horse carousel on the Frog Pond in Boston Common may be one way to spin back to the days of youth, long before tests trumped fun and pillaged precious playtime, and when stress was defined by finishing the broccoli on a dinner plate instead of a 20-page paper.
For sophomore Emma Van Der Weerd and junior Jonathan Hoopes, Sunday night is date night. Last Sunday, Hoopes introduced Van Der Weerd to what he called the world's best calamari, and Van Der Weerd was surprised by how much she enjoyed her first time trying squid and exploring Little Italy with her adventurous companion.
"Overall, it's just nice to have something to break up the day," Van Der Weerd said. "We don't regret taking time earlier in the day to do something fun, even if it means sleeping less that night. Sometimes we will even just take a break from work and go sit outside for a little while. Something as simple as that helps to reduce stress."
