Not every weekend has to be exciting: The danger of the question “Anything exciting happen?”
Originally published on Medium
As an ASL interpreter for college classes, I watched multiple professors interact with students and noticed they often used words like “exciting” when asking about how students spent their free time. This story is inspired by the ones who replied “Nothing.”
The professor opens the evening college class with a chipper “How was your weekend?” A student in the bottom left corner of the Zoom gallery screen smiles, remembering Saturday’s long walk through the local park, warm sun shining, feeling good for the first time in a long while with no homework to worry about.
The professor adds “Anything exciting happen?”
The student frowns and reexamines the memory for any exciting elements.
Is a walk exciting? Possibly. But not a walk through a regular local park. Maybe one in the mountains is.
Is the warm sun shining exciting? Not really. It’s a pretty basic occurrence in the southern states of the USA.
Is feeling good exciting? Maybe if the feeling was great or awesome but not just good.
And anything to do with homework is never exciting, no need to even ask.
One by one the other students offer up a short rendition of an exciting weekend while, for one reason after another, the student in the bottom left corner of the Zoom rejects sharing a fond memory.
It’s their turn now. “What about you?”
The student shrugs and says “No, nothing exciting.”
