Cautiously, I prowled into the classroom on the hunt for a suitable seat. I tried to remember what my buddies in Writer’s told me about the unwritten rules of college seating. First row was for the people who were ready to learn and were not afraid of the professor. Second row was for those who were ready to learn and meet new people. Third row and beyond was for the more laid back and social students. 

But I didn’t seem to fit into any of those categories, so where was I to sit? It wasn’t like I had an entire class hall of three hundred seats to choose from. It was a small classroom, with four seats per row of tables and five rows. I was too afraid to sit up front. I was also too nervous to sit in the center. And I wasn’t social enough to sit in any of the back rows. 

After a minor silent freakout, I chose the last available seat at the very end of the first row. I was still scared of my professor, but at least at the end, I would be left alone. Right? I got settled and seated with my laptop, notebook, and a handful of colorful pens on the table in front of me, just in time to see the professor stroll into the classroom, quietly closing the door behind her. 

"Man, you guys are so quiet!" she remarked as she adjusted her glasses. Indeed, the room had been dead silent the entire time. Everyone seemed just as scared shitless and clueless as I was. 

"Well..." she continued as she began to write some introductory notes on the white board with a blue marker, "That'll change soon enough. I understand that we're all a little more on the feral side thanks to current events, so we're gonna take it just one day at a time. And, within a few weeks,  I hope everyone will be a socialite again. Agree?"

Everyone nodded silently. A few nervously chuckled. 

"Great!" the professor laughed clapping her hands together, "Let's begin then."

The feelings of tension and anxiety began to dissipate as the professor introduced herself and began to go over the syllabus for the semester. It was clear, both from her background and the way she was going over the syllabus, that she'd been a professor for a very long time. She was what I'd call a "master teacher", especially since she made something as boring as a syllabus almost as fun as a birthday party. Within the first hour of the class, everyone (including myself) had relaxed enough to not only talk to the professor, but also talk among ourselves about our lives and interests. 

Somehow, the professor knew how to turn certain things in the syllabus into hilarious memes that had us howling with laughter. Other times, when the lecture got a little dull, she'd have us take little "brain breaks" where we'd watch a funny Youtube video or she'd share another funny story. By the time we'd managed to go over the entire syllabus (which took over an hour but honestly felt like it only took ten minutes), I was shocked by just how much fun I was having. I was even more surprised by how much I'd relaxed. 

After we went over the syllabus, the professor decided to split the class into two equal groups, then gave each group a deck of astronomy cards. 

"Alrighty, class!" she began, "Without using the internet or your textbooks, I want you guys to put these cards in order from oldest event to newest event in ten minutes. When the ten minutes are up, I will have two people from each group come up and fight each other to the death over whose more right. Sound like fun?"

Of course, everyone in the room began to heckle like the bloodthirsty hyenas we were until each group had their cards spread out on their tables. Then, we got to work discussing the cards and where we thought they'd go, even though none of us (at least in my group) knew much more than when the earth formed and when the first man stepped foot on the moon.