Apps and Introspection

So, the season of college applications is utterly upon us.

I suppose I should be happy that my parents are letting me apply to MIT EA (they are SUPER cool and all of their coolness cannot be contained within one parenthetical statement), but I can't bring myself to feel as happy as I should be, i.e. bouncing off the walls, screaming up and down, acting out all the trappings of excitedness short of being actually accepted (through a miracle). I guess it's because they wouldn't let me go there if I did get in. But the college application is about you, not your parents! The invisible audience/readership cries. Yes, yes, I keep hearing that. Ultimately, I get it that it's my decision (I will be a legal adult by that time, anyway), but it's just so difficult.

There's no use in thinking about that issue now, however. I don't even know if I'll be accepted to any of the schools on my list, much less MIT. So for now, I have to focus on the application itself, and try to paint the most honest picture of me that can be portrayed to the admissions committees of MIT and various other post-secondary schools.

Part of me is excited about this process, as I get to make many trips down memory lane and reminisce about days when life was seemingly simpler, and all I had to worry about was practicing enough piano. But sometimes, the pressure and stress block the lane and I sit there, unable to remember even one reason why I enjoyed elementary school so much (was there something about soup?).

I've got to let it go. I've also got to let go all the nasty jealousy monsters that have been popping up whenever I think or hear about my friends' accomplishments. I am extremely proud of them, and they are amazingly accomplished! But it all adds to my inferiority complex, and I feel like I won't be admitted to any college once they realize how many opportunities I squandered as a lazy freshman/sophomore/junior.

But we can never go backward, only forward (I am 99.999995% sure that this is a quote by someone, +/- 0.05% error). "We are never told what might have happened." (Now this is a real quote, by C.S. Lewis, one of the coolest writers ever, for his philosophy about stories and many, many other reasons.) The only possible way I can "atone" for missing out during my young life is to seize opportunities wisely in college and beyond, and look at everything with a critical and analytical eye, but trusting intangible qualities of life and God when I have exhausted everything in my power. And while I'm exhausting everything in my power.

Tee minus nine times sixty minutes

Huzzah, I have maintained once-a-week posting for a successful two weeks! But seriously, I thought about posting earlier, but I was all homework and nothing creative happened in my brain. Except for choosing to complete a psych group activity in purple ink. But that's hardly creative.

Life is a swirl of college applications, scholarship applications, essays to be written that have nothing to do with school (I do not count college apps towards my school work, as it is not turned in for a grade. ooh I would be an awesome teacher. not really), and an imaginary list in my mind that consists of things I would absolutely LOVE to do/finish, but do not have the time for because of college apps, other apps, and homework. So my life this week has gone back to being tinged with the queasy tone of a yearning to accomplish great and creative things while chained to the cold cell of reality by my procrastinatory tendencies-combined-with-Internet. Or I am just going through another phase of information overload, when I have realized that I can do anything, and want to do everything, but must choose between everything because there are only twenty-four hours in a day, at least six of which must be devoted to sleeping so my brain does not go on strike.

So, in the spirit of trying to do things (both required by various organizations and not), I shall make a list of things I would like to do, very much, if I have the time:

1. Write a collection of short stories. I have the ideas. They must go on real virtual paper.
2. Draw birthday cards for all my friends. I like drawing, and my friends. This is an inevitable combination of the two.
3. Practice piano. I am only writing it here because I really need to do so. Extremely.
4. Learn Perl. Just because.

There, that isn't such a bad list, is it? I should have plenty of time to--OH MY GOSH IT IS MIDNIGHT AND I HAVE DONE NOTHING PRODUCTIVE.

I really hope that's not how today turns out to be. I've got nine hours. I've got to make them count.

Genesis

This is reintroduction to the blog, as I have some Very Defined Goals for it right now, after years of on-again-off-again posting as my whims dictated.

And so, presenting said Very Defined Goals!

1) Chronicle my last year of being in public (i.e. free) schooling FOREVER. Hooray for introspection and all that (and a psych class), with ramblings on school classes, school social constructs, college applications, and whatever else might pop into my brain as if it was the opposite of the birth of Athena!

2) Yeah, that's pretty much it.

I'm going to try to keep to a schedule of posting at least once a week, probably on Fridays, as I won't have to deal with immediate school homework deadlines.

And so, presenting the Very First Days!

School started normally enough. The first day was mostly a waste of time. The official day for all non-freshman started at around noon (not including the pointless pepfest that lasted for forty-five minutes), and ended around three hours later in a swirl of syllabi, seating assignments, and tales of summer activities/teachers' private lives. Except for calculus BC (which is really more like multivariable calc--it's complicated) when we started with REAL NOTES!! I think that is going to be my favorite class, even though I haven't done real math in such a long time and my problem solving skills have gone deeper underground than a badgermole.

The second day was the official first day, with full-length classes and all that exciting stuff. Lots more homework than I've ever gotten at the same time. My planner is looking like how it would usually look in the middle of a semester, not at the beginning. My sleep schedule is behaving likewise. Getting only five to six hours of sleep is not as fun anymore.

I learned all about microarray analysis. My mind is blown. DNA is infinitely more complicated than I ever imagined it to be. I love biochemistry.

The next day I gathered proof that my social skills are extremely sub-par (I think they went AWOL along with my problem solving skills). Makes me wonder how I will survive the independence required of a college student. (this could be fodder for a full-length post)

Friday's have gotten more and more appealing as my high school career progressed. I love Fridays now.

Well, that's it for now because my memory is shaky and I have piles and piles of homework waiting to teeter over and consume the electronic bits of my workspace (ooh, fancy). Thank goodness for typewriters.