| | 2004: Year in Review
This past year hasn't been a good one. I'm not sure it would
qualify for Worst Year Ever, but it's not the best I've had,
either. While no single event was particularly awful, I spent the
entire year slacking my way down a gentle slope of failure and
indifference. Then I hit a bump, or maybe a sharp rock, so I
jumped off of that hill and began rappelling down the rocky cliff-face
of...okay, the metaphor fell apart a long time ago.
Anyway, I'm not there anymore, and hopefully the stage is set for 2005: A Year of Transition and Transformation.
Let's take a look back at how we got here.
January: I go
back to school for the second semester of sophomore year. I'm not
excited about this at first, but once I get back I remember how much I
like school, which is a whole heck of a lot. At this point I'm a
double major, and I'm living in a triple. I have more work than I
am physically able to do, and I think this is funny. I am REALLY
into The Apprentice.
February: Less
than a month into the semester, the sleep dep starts to kick in
hardcore. I always bring a sweater to Quantum because I know I'll
start getting sleepy about fifteen minutes in, and I'll want something
comfy to rest my head on. I spend most of my time sleeping,
eating junk food, watching TV (Friends, Scrubs, The Apprentice, ER,
SNL), and grading. You'll notice I didn't mention homework.
Or going to class. I gain five pounds. I find out that my
persistent back pain is caused not by lupus or costochondritis, but by
scoliosis. I start physical therapy but quit after two sessions
because I can never find the time to go.
March: I spend
Spring Break at school. I talk to Beverly for the first
time. A CMC professor's car is vandalized in an apparent hate
crime, the culmination of a series of such events, beginning with the
burning of an eleven-foot cross in January. Classes are
cancelled, and there's a big 5-C rally. Controversy, bickering,
and a flame war or three on community-l. It is later revealed
that the professor, who's a bit of a nut, vandalized her own car.
April: Room Draw
happens. I stop taking my birth control pills because they're
making me fat, or at least helping by giving me mad sugar
cravings. I've gained more than ten pounds since January.
One night, I go to the grocery store and buy 47,000 calories' worth
(yes, really) of cookies, cakes, donuts, icing, marshmallows,
etc. I am strangely proud of myself and eat all of it in a little
over three weeks. I now have SO MUCH work to do that I experience
short bursts of ridiculous, exhilarating efficiency, during one of
which I research and write my entire Quantum term paper in 39 hours and
document the process on xanga.
May: Friends is over. Finals
week. I have seven exams, most of which go badly. I finally
write my history paper, only a month after it's due. I have a
metric shit-ton of make-up work to do, but somehow it all gets
done. I go slightly insane in the process. Six hours after
my semester ends, Summer Math (for which I'm grading and tutoring)
begins. I move to Case.
June: Grading
grading grading. I volunteer to be in charge of buying breakfast
for about 80 students five days a week, and it turns out to be my
favorite part of the job. I become addicted to Ben &
Jerry's. I learn how to cook falafel. I switch to Firefox
and enter the glorious world of tabbed browsing. I join the
bridge club and love it. I spend a lot of time in the math
library at odd hours of the night. June is a happy month.
July:
Home. I turn twenty, and my friends bake me a scrumptious
chocolate-chip/brownie/fudge cake. I see my grades, and while I
didn't fail anything this semester (that D- in Quantum was some sort of
miracle), I'm on academic probation, and it's pretty clear that I'll
have to give up one of my majors. After much contemplation,
dicussion, and gnashing of teeth, I decide to drop math and hang on to
physics, which surprises some people, including me.
August: My first
non-Mudd job! I have a sudden flash of inspiration, and within a
week or two I become an SAT tutor for Kaplan. I go to a few
training sessions in Houston, planning to transfer to LA when school
starts. I see my brother for the first time since January.
A tree falls on our house. I have minor surgery. I go back
to school--living in a double now, with a kitchenette and its own
bathroom. I am optimistic that I'll be able to turn things around
this semester.
September: I'm
taking 10 classes worth 15 credits (4*3 + 3*1 +3*0). This is only
an average load--the first time in five semesters I'm not
overloading. I'm an AE tutor now, in addition to tutoring for
Kaplan, and I love it all. I'm co-president of Quiz Bowl and head
grader for Math 61/62. I play tennis on the weekends. I
begin to hate Electronics Lab. I remember why I hate Stems and
PFD. I love Astro--a first for a lab class. Near the end of
the month, everything catches up to me and I stop working. It's
all downhill from here.
October: I am
officially behind in all of my classes. I start sleeping through
a few Stems lectures and am in a generally pissy mood. The week
before Fall Break there's a major crunch when everything's due.
Usually at times like this (see May) I can kick it into gear and do a
crazy amount of work, but this time...nothing. I am on the verge
of failing everything, and we're only halfway through the
semester. We get facebook. I move into the astro lab, and
from this point on I spend more time there than I do in my room.
November: I vote
for the first time ever, as Jesus fever sweeps the nation. By now
the backlog of work I have to do has piled up so high that there's no
way I can dig myself out, but I keep on keepin on because I don't know
what else to do. I begin meeting weekly with Beverly again, not
having talked to her since June. I go observing by myself and
have a ball. I start listening to country music. I drop
Math Forum and PFD. I decide to take a semester off. I
visit Palomar. After lots of discussion with lots of supportive,
wonderful people, I decide to give up on this shithole of a semester
and withdraw. It's a huge relief, but also disgusting and a
little scary.
December: I tie
up loose ends in Claremont and drive home before finals week.
I've decided not to live there next semester, and I'm considering
moving to Holland. Relatives visit for a week around Christmas
and we have fun showing them around. Tsunami. I am
reintroduced to television. I bake stuff. I host game night
for the first time in at least a year, maybe two.
So that's my year. It's funny--fall semester seems so long ago,
though it hasn't been much more than a month since I withdrew. I
guess I was in such a different frame of mind than I am now that I can
hardly relate.
An update on my plans: I've decided not to move to Europe this
semester. I might spend a few weeks there sometime in March or
April, but that would just be as a vacation. I figure I can
always study abroad there next spring if I really want to go--it's too
much hassle on such short notice to do it now.
Instead, I'll move into my own apartment somewhere in Houston, probably
before the end of January, and work for Kaplan here. I'll
probably pick up a second job, too, unless I can get them to give me a
LOT of extra work.
So that's where I am now. Maybe I'll post my resolutions sometime later, so y'all can keep me honest.
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| | Posted 1/5/2005 6:52 PM - 67 views - 1 comments
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