[but I will hold on hope]
So school is killing me slowly, but weirdly enough, I don't think I'm dying.
I haven't worked this hard since high school (and anyone who's known me more than a year or two knows what high school did to my mental condition), but I'm not nearing nervous breakdown. I kind of really should be - I have close to 400 pages to read in various things by next week, I have something like 5 written things to turn in (and not small things), I've signed up for too much damn music and too many performances and I've practiced nine hours of taiko this week in preparation for three performances next week, and every week I finish on Friday and think, "Next week has to be less intense!" but every week for the past four weeks I have been proven completely wrong come Monday.
But I'm not dying. I don't sit down to my work and idly wonder if I'd rather be undergoing a root canal without anesthetic than writing another lab report. I don't hate what I'm reading. I'm not angry when I wake up in the morning. I keep looking at my to-do list and wondering when it's going to hit me that I have the workload of two people and should really be curled up in a ball under my desk in a fort made out of anthropology textbooks, sobbing for my lost free time.
But it keeps not hitting me. And things keep getting done. It's kind of weird! Things keep getting done! And not just done, not AP-Calculus done where "done" meant "I probably will make more than a 30 on this," but DONE, well done, full-marks-on-my-poetry-analysis done, 98-on-my-muggle-studies-midterm done, wow-that-elegie's-actually-improved-since-last-week done. I'm happy. There are moments of stress, but overall, I'm really, really happy.
I attribute this to a few things: First, the weather. It's so much easier to be happy about school when you walk to class in the 70-degree sunshine. Yeah, this changes, but we've had a good week of perfect weather now. Thank you, Oklahoma.
Second, the fact that I sleep. I slept so goddamn little in high school, particularly in senior year. I remember waking up before the sunrise on five hours of sleep, and I remember hitting my alarm and hating the world. I remember sleeping through class (something I have yet to do in college), I remember staying up so damn late and still not getting anything done, I remember how my eyes always felt heavy and the circles under them in my driver's license photo. It's amazing what waking up after the sun does for my mood. I love the morning hours now, when I have time to relax after seven hours of sleep, to check Facebook and Plurk before class, to organize the day before it happens, sometimes even to walk to Catlett and practice before Ecology. I guard my sleep jealously now; people tell me I'm too goddamn busy, but I've never pulled an all-nighter. I refuse to pull an all-nighter. Sleep is priority number one - I work so hard during the day because I refuse to wake up hating the world anymore.
And then there are the people I do this with. In high school, I was too busy to see people. I always had to reschedule, to cut my hours with people short, to apologize and make excuses for why I couldn't go here or there. Here, I still don't see people as often as I'd like - I miss the Couch Armada and the DB and late nights in whatever social lounge we feel like taking over. But every evening, there's dinner together at the caf with the Improv People, and almost every evening time with Arashi, and being with and around people and laughing and talking-- how the fuck did I forget how much I need that?
But you know? The biggest thing? I think I've finally found the balance between what I love and what I want from my life. I love my new major. I fucking love it. I love having a plan, having something I truly, truly want to do with my life, and feeling like even these stupid pre-reqs are going to help me accomplish that. And I love having music be what calms me again; I love spending an hour picking out my stupid level-3 piano crap, I love spending hours alone with the Faure Elegie just because it's beautiful, I love singing Whitacre. Oh god, I love singing Whitacre. I have my goals and I have my passion in their proper compartments again, and so even work doesn't feel like work.
So I'm happy. I'm so happy. There are minor inconveniences (FUCK THE BURSAR) and hard days, but overall, I'm still energized and so happy to be here. I've settled in, and the rest of this semester is going to be Totally Awesome, the damn research paper notwithstanding.
Hell, the way things are going now, I am fully prepared to enjoy the fuck out of that research paper. Can this unbridled optimism continue, please?
OH ALSO FOR THOSE NOT IN THE KNOW: I'm coming home for Spring Break! From the 12th to the 20th I'll be around. My family has requested a day or two from me at towards the end of the week, but otherwise I'll be around for hangouts! I miss you all terribly! Schedule things with me! 8D
I haven't worked this hard since high school (and anyone who's known me more than a year or two knows what high school did to my mental condition), but I'm not nearing nervous breakdown. I kind of really should be - I have close to 400 pages to read in various things by next week, I have something like 5 written things to turn in (and not small things), I've signed up for too much damn music and too many performances and I've practiced nine hours of taiko this week in preparation for three performances next week, and every week I finish on Friday and think, "Next week has to be less intense!" but every week for the past four weeks I have been proven completely wrong come Monday.
But I'm not dying. I don't sit down to my work and idly wonder if I'd rather be undergoing a root canal without anesthetic than writing another lab report. I don't hate what I'm reading. I'm not angry when I wake up in the morning. I keep looking at my to-do list and wondering when it's going to hit me that I have the workload of two people and should really be curled up in a ball under my desk in a fort made out of anthropology textbooks, sobbing for my lost free time.
But it keeps not hitting me. And things keep getting done. It's kind of weird! Things keep getting done! And not just done, not AP-Calculus done where "done" meant "I probably will make more than a 30 on this," but DONE, well done, full-marks-on-my-poetry-analysis done, 98-on-my-muggle-studies-midterm done, wow-that-elegie's-actually-improved-since-last-week done. I'm happy. There are moments of stress, but overall, I'm really, really happy.
I attribute this to a few things: First, the weather. It's so much easier to be happy about school when you walk to class in the 70-degree sunshine. Yeah, this changes, but we've had a good week of perfect weather now. Thank you, Oklahoma.
Second, the fact that I sleep. I slept so goddamn little in high school, particularly in senior year. I remember waking up before the sunrise on five hours of sleep, and I remember hitting my alarm and hating the world. I remember sleeping through class (something I have yet to do in college), I remember staying up so damn late and still not getting anything done, I remember how my eyes always felt heavy and the circles under them in my driver's license photo. It's amazing what waking up after the sun does for my mood. I love the morning hours now, when I have time to relax after seven hours of sleep, to check Facebook and Plurk before class, to organize the day before it happens, sometimes even to walk to Catlett and practice before Ecology. I guard my sleep jealously now; people tell me I'm too goddamn busy, but I've never pulled an all-nighter. I refuse to pull an all-nighter. Sleep is priority number one - I work so hard during the day because I refuse to wake up hating the world anymore.
And then there are the people I do this with. In high school, I was too busy to see people. I always had to reschedule, to cut my hours with people short, to apologize and make excuses for why I couldn't go here or there. Here, I still don't see people as often as I'd like - I miss the Couch Armada and the DB and late nights in whatever social lounge we feel like taking over. But every evening, there's dinner together at the caf with the Improv People, and almost every evening time with Arashi, and being with and around people and laughing and talking-- how the fuck did I forget how much I need that?
But you know? The biggest thing? I think I've finally found the balance between what I love and what I want from my life. I love my new major. I fucking love it. I love having a plan, having something I truly, truly want to do with my life, and feeling like even these stupid pre-reqs are going to help me accomplish that. And I love having music be what calms me again; I love spending an hour picking out my stupid level-3 piano crap, I love spending hours alone with the Faure Elegie just because it's beautiful, I love singing Whitacre. Oh god, I love singing Whitacre. I have my goals and I have my passion in their proper compartments again, and so even work doesn't feel like work.
So I'm happy. I'm so happy. There are minor inconveniences (FUCK THE BURSAR) and hard days, but overall, I'm still energized and so happy to be here. I've settled in, and the rest of this semester is going to be Totally Awesome, the damn research paper notwithstanding.
Hell, the way things are going now, I am fully prepared to enjoy the fuck out of that research paper. Can this unbridled optimism continue, please?
OH ALSO FOR THOSE NOT IN THE KNOW: I'm coming home for Spring Break! From the 12th to the 20th I'll be around. My family has requested a day or two from me at towards the end of the week, but otherwise I'll be around for hangouts! I miss you all terribly! Schedule things with me! 8D