Muktadir 1

Sagufta Muktadir

Professor Jan Babcock

English 138T

30 January 2023

Seat Snatcher

I believe in stealing seats. Yup, snatching them from someone like the world is my oyster

and people are just waiting for me to make the first move.

It was sunny – I know this because the Sun was making it hard for me to see the Apple

Maps I had pulled up on my phone. It was my third day of literal college, and I prayed that I

arrived at the right building. To make matters worse, I had come alone because the people I hung

out with during the past week didn’t have the same classes as me.

Drenched in sweat and nervous energy, I opened the door to the Health and Human

Development building letting the cool air tickle my skin. This was my second class of math, and

I wanted to rip my eyeballs out because I knew how tedious it would be. And to top it all off, I

knew I had to hunt for a seat in this class because every single chair would be filled with another

bright-eyed student hoping to not learn theories again. When I entered the room, I found a seat,

marked it with an imaginary arrow with my name on it and beelined to it. The girl next to me

looked at me with a confused look on her face “umm…I think someone was sitting here last

time”. At that moment, I knew I had two choices – either forget that seat and sit in the very front

by myself or sit here and see where this leads to. I chose the latter and just shrugged my shoulder

as I sat next to her. Maybe, that seat was blessed by the person who sat before me or something

because that decision singlehandedly shaped my first semester.

 Muktadir 2

As stupid as it is to believe in stealing seats, I think I knew that I had to take a chance, but

I had to grasp it myself. That single decision to steal that person’s seat and watch the original

owner look at me and sit in the front of the classroom etched my destiny. I wield the sword (or

rather the pencil and calculator) of my own life. I didn’t know it, but that day, I started the future

with my closest friends who were in that faithful class and didn’t know I existed, yet. I started

the future of staying up till 2 AM laughing at something stupid we did. That girl who talked to

me became my roommate. I started the future of love that I know I will never forget.

So, yes, I am the seat stealer, snatcher, whatever you want to call it because I believe in

sitting down and shrugging my shoulders as I make my own life to live.