good blog writing is seriously hard to find these days. good writing that strikes a personal, but not overly melodramatic, chord in someone. something that is restrained yet melodious, rich yet neat and orderly. part of the reason why i have given up blogging is because of this feeling of inferiority. i was reading some stuff i had written for class 4 years ago as a freshmen, and i am shocked by how much i have retrogressed (from a place that wasn't much to begin with...humility!). my writing has become much more mechanical, but without the sense of restrained eloquence that i want from more structure and order. the personal voice has completely faded. there is no attempt at humor (that usually accompanied the melodramatic exhortations, but nonetheless), just this thin gloss of melancholy that is too insincere to be anything but bad art.

OK, so i need a new start. maybe some sense of passion to be instilled in me somehow. part of another reason why i don't blog anymore, besides general complacency and happiness, is not much provokes me anymore. i blame it on the transitory state brought on by graduation, in which i slowly feel my insides hardening to adjust to the idea of leaving the states permanently... but it has to stop! at some point. at some point colors and lines and movements and words will have to move me again, even if i have to cram excel and accounting once again before training starts.

more than anything, i need that voice to come back.

achievements include

-a 0.2 drop in my GPA, ending up just marginally above the lowest boundaries for honors and maintaining my benjamin franklin scholars status
-the first C's in my academic life, ever
-almost failing an econ class by walking into each exam blind and without ever going to class, and consequently almost failing my econ major (but i didn't fail, no worries)
-blowing off 30% of my history seminar grade component by not handing in any weekly responses and handing in my 35% final paper in a week late, and ending up with a B
-only ever doing half of my int'l trade homework because i start at 3am (class at 9am) but still ending up with scores above the average in all four exams
-researching and writing my thesis in the span of one week and ending up with an A-

i intended these failures. maybe the chinese proverb likes to advocate "have a beginning, have an end" but this is the derailment that i have needed for the too many academic years of my life. coming from a taiwanese background, i have been ranked in class and worried about midterms and finals since first grade (and that is not a joke). some have looked at me this semester and wondered about the choices that i made- this deliberate dismissal of school and its work. but for me, work is only as important as learning and a minimum level of respect for the passion of knowledge (which does not necessarily extend to all classes because certainly not all professors have such passion). the bubble of hierarchies and validation, beyond simple plain good learning, is ultimately empty.

i will probably regret all of this come time to apply for grad schools- but for now, mediocrity is strangely liberating.