Look at you. Small…pathetic. Like writhing eels waiting for feed. Don’t you see? I own you. Do you realize the extent to which I can turn you to dust with the simple click of a button? O! You pitiful fools! I could destroy your small, insignificant lives with but one email.

Everything you do today, tomorrow, and the next day depends on my benevolence. Should I want, I can shut everything down, reduce everything to nothing, to less than nothing, by simply sending an email saying “Transition to Remote Learning.”

When I crave entertainment, I like to send out an email where nothing changes but I title it something like “New COVID-19 Updates.” Seeing you all scramble and panic like ants in a colony destroyed by my boot brings me my only source of joy in this world. Yes…squirm.

When you wake up in the morning and go to class, you should be thanking, no, praising me for allowing this day at Brown to begin. When you eat in the dining halls, you should be leaving half of your food untouched on the plate as a sacrifice to me, for it is only through my grace that the dining halls remain open. When you go to sleep in your dorm, say my name 100 times before your eyes close. If you do not do this, I will send an email that shuts down the dorms and sends you all back to the muddy hovels whence you came.

I may be a provost in title, but in essence, I am a god.

I do not threaten to shut down the school for fear of the pandemic, oh no, no. I do so to force you all to know my power, great and terrible in scale. I do not fear COVID because I cannot die. Yes, I am immortal. Long after my body has left this world, I will live on in the fear you will feel for the rest of your lives when you receive an email, and feel a small pang of terror chill your body at the memory of this year, when my emails had the power to end you.

So stay on high alert, my writhing eels; more “important COVID-19 updates” await.

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