It has been difficult to manage time in the past due to procrastination on my end. I tend to leave doing my tasks, chores, or assignments until the last minute. For some reason, I would always make it just in time or be a few minutes late. There are times, though, when doing a chore really late can push the other things I am supposed to do backwards, and as such, I end up using my resting time to cover up. I usually tell myself this whenever I am late: ‘better late than never’. I have used this phrase so much, and to date, I still find myself struggling to get to my appointments on time.
I remember a particular day when I was to write a course exam at school. The exam was slated for 7 a.m. and was computer-based. I assumed that a lot of students were going to write this exam because I thought it was a general exam for all faculties, but it was only for the science faculties. Usually, students had to line up to have their course forms and themselves checked physically before being allowed into the examination hall. I got to the exam hall at 9 a.m., and I saw no queue at the entrance of the CBT center. Everyone has already written the exams or are about to finish them. I went to the security personnel that check students before going in and started to plead with them to let me in. A few other students like me also joined me; we were six in number and started to plead. Some invigilators of the same exam who were done with their work came outside and asked what the commotion was about, and the security personnel explained what had happened. We were treated harshly.
‘Did you sleep off? Why did you decide to come to the exam hall late? You will not write this exam today!’, one invigilator said. ‘Let them carry over the course’, another invigilator added. Imagine your lackadaisical attitude towards your exam. What would your parents say if they found out about this after investing so much in you?', another one said.
‘Ah! Please! No! My life is finished’. These were some of the things being said by us, the students. We fell on our knees and continued to plead with them for some time.
There was a man who had been quiet all along; he said, ‘Let them write. It seems that they have understood the repercussions of coming late. Check their course forms and allow them to write this exam’. I could swear that at that moment, my knees were weak with gratitude. ‘Oh! God bless this man!’ I thought. Shouts of gratitude and a promise never to allow such a thing to repeat itself came from us, the students, and we were finally allowed to write the exam.
After this particular event, I decided to always arrive on time. I would have automatically failed that exam and repeated it the next year if I hadn’t written it. The phrase ‘better late than never’ couldn’t get me out of that mess, surely.