Current blog: http://www.the-streame.com/
Current science blog: http://coffee-break-psu.blogspot.com/

Adventure.

This summer has come off to an amazing start. From CFA roof, to Doherty roof, to Kennywood, to roof pong, to midnight football, to High School Musical, to Camp Rock (yes we are very cool), to Pamela's, to Frisbee, to Fuel and Fuddle...I hope it will be like this for the next few months.

Work.

I can't believe the first week of summer is already gone. With my job, internship, and a messed up sleep schedule, the past few days seem to have flown by so quickly. Today was the busiest day of the week: after having only three and a half hours of sleep last night (I wasn't tired so I decided to stay up cleaning, packing, and fixing the goddamn mini fridge), I woke up at 7am for work. I stopped by Subway, like I have every day of this week, and got my $3 Breakfast Combo -- a 6 inch sub with ham, egg, cheese, lettuce, onions, and tomatoes, plus a free coffee! I then spent the next four and half hours making mailing envelopes, doing inventory, cleaning kitchens and conference rooms, replenishing supply closets, and running other such errands. I really like it at the Office of Computing Services. Everyone who works there is so friendly and welcoming and I've really begun to take pride in being part of the office staff.

Anyways, after I got off work at 12:30 today, I caught a 61D to Oakland just in time. I got off at Fifth and Thackery and made a beeline for Five Guys, but I arrived one second too late and ended up behind a long line of summer camp kids. Walking out of the store, I spotted a little bagel shop across the street, where I very happily purchased a $2 bagel with cream cheese (using money that I actually worked for myself has made me extremely frugal, if you haven't noticed. I had leftover pizza for dinner later in the night, too.) I then made my way to Allen Hall, where I met up with the professor I am interning for this summer. From 1:00 to about 5:30, I worked on various assignments that he gave me. To be honest, I was a little nervous at the start of the summer to be working with such an influential and intelligent professor on the Sloan Digitial Sky Survey, which I knew virtually nothing about, but I have actually been able to learn a vast amount of information in just the past week alone and am feeling really confident about the rest of the summer. I am amazed by how the gigantic (and beautiful) telescope in New Mexico uses plates plugged with optical fibers to locate specific galaxy clusters. I am in awe of how light traveling through the early Universe created baryon acoustic oscillations which have left imprints in the cosmic microwave background radiation, resulting in the spatial distribution of galaxy clusters we see today. I am intrigued by how exoplanets too far away to be seen can still be detected by the Doppler Effect they create on the spectrum of the star they are orbiting. I am excited not just to learn more, and not just for the rest of the summer -- I am excited to seriously pursue a career path in physics and astronomy. For the first time, I am no longer worried about what will happen after college, because I have something I want, something to aim for, something to work towards. Having motivation makes all the difference.

Freshman Firsts.

As I sit here in my dorm I hear the unfamiliar voices of my floormates' parents outside my door. Storage boxes line the hallway and cars with open trunks line the streets, ready to be loaded and driven home. I wish I was going home too, but I'll be staying in Pittsburgh for a summer internship. While I prepare myself for the exciting months ahead of me, I am simultaneously thinking back on the months that have just passed -- the months which made up my freshman year of college, the months that came to an end yesterday afternoon as I handed in my last final exam.

I still remember August of last year, when I sat on my bed at home and looked around myself at my unusually clean room. The books were stacked neatly on their shelves, the table cleared off and covered only with the glow of an old desk lamp, the violin stand tucked into a corner and the violin against the wall, the closet almost empty, and the suitcases, which I tried to pack my whole life in, waiting near the door for the moment I'd move out. I was nervous to leave the town where I lived for my entire life, nervous to leave the parents who loved and supported me through everything I did, nervous to leave the friends who I shared so many unforgettable memories with. And yet, as orientation week rolled around the corner, I was thrown into a world of complete strangers, unfamiliar surroundings, a bed that was too high, bus routes which confused me, and food that was much too salty. Everything became a blur of "What's your name? What's your major? Where are you from? What dorm do you  live in?" I felt as if I met more people in that one week than I had met my whole life. It was crazy.

It wasn't long, though, before I began to say things like "I'm going home now" when I was headed to my dorm, or before I began to eat every meal with a regular group of people -- the people who are now my best friends. Classes were hard, there's no doubt about that, but it was through those hours of frustration trying to figure out problem sets together that I became friends with half of the people I am close with today. Life began to settle into a regular pattern. Pretty soon, I was figuring out who I going to live with next year, locking down a job and internship for the summer, and making a Four Year Plan with my academic adviser. Then came Carnival, then two weeks of hell as I spent every free moment coding my term project, then finals week. And just like that, my freshman year was over.

I learned some things this year. There are the simple things, like learning how to keep a checkbook, how to take a bus to South Side or the Waterfront or Squirrel Hill, how to fill out tax forms, how not to get drunk, and how to fly home and back to Pittsburgh by myself. But then there are the other things: I learned how much I depend on my parents, I learned how genuinely good people all my friends are, I learned how small my accomplishments are compared to those of some other so talented people here, I learned what trust is and what it means to abuse it, I learned how important it is not to waste money, and I learned how often it is that people make mistakes. I learned that things never turn out the way you expect them to -- freshman year sure didn't -- but I also learned that once you accept this, happiness is never far away.

Renaissance.

I wish I was more cultured. Sophisticated. I'm sitting here now in sweatpants and my hair down, but every once in a while I dream of wearing an elegant gown with a criss-crossed corset design in the back. It would be strapless, perhaps light pink, and I would have my hair up - although a couple of loose, curled strands would still be allowed to fall in my face. My eyes would be bright and full of life, my lips curved in a polite smile. I don't know where I would be or who I'd be with. Maybe at a ball, maybe having afternoon tea. We would talk about Monet's lily pads and Van Gogh's tortured soul. We'd compare the architecture from the Baroque period and the Gothic period. We would discuss impressionism and realism. Beautiful music would fill the background, and I would know exactly who the composer was. Sometimes, when I have watched too many superficial movies or filled too many of my conversations with meaningless gossip, my life feels rather trivial. Silly. I ought to sit down with a proper cup of coffee and read Edith Wharton's The Age of Innocence or take out a sketch pad and draw something beautiful. Now that would be a better use of time.

By the way, I self narrated all of this in an English accent. But even in my head, I don't think I could get that right.

2012.

I have only one new years resolution for 2012 and that is to keep things simple. This past year has been weird, hectic, and much too complicated. It had it's great moments, of course - prom, graduation, probably one of the best summers of my life, my first semester at Carnegie Mellon, and making new friendships that will last a lifetime - but it's left me with some regrets as well, some mistakes that I hope to never make again, disappointments that I should've seen coming, and guilt that I have only myself to blame for. I mean, you definitely learn from the trials of life, and ups and downs are inevitable, but I've found that when I stay true to myself and the values and morals that my family has taught me, life tends to be easier, simpler, and better. So this year, I don't have to strive for perfection or set a million goals for myself to achieve; I just want to keep life simple and keep the mirror clean - so when I look at my own reflection, it's the girl I've always been.

Winter Break.

Something about tonight has left me inexplicably teary-eyed. I can't quite place my finger on what it is I'm feeling right now - sadness? disappointment? confusion? - but whatever the emotion, it has left me with a bruised heart, the kind of ache that pulses dully below the surface, harmless if untouched, but reaching deep into the past. It's just strange to come back home for winter break and discover that the people you held dearest to you, the people you believed would be your closest confidants long after high school, have changed - maybe not obviously, but in little ways that mattered to you. I love my friends, I admire them, I look up to them, they make me who I am...so I guess it's upsetting to see them with changed attitudes that conflict with my own morals. Will we walk away from each other? Who will be better off? What if this is just the beginning, what if we're still young, what if years from now I won't even remember the names of the people who, right now, I am so scared of losing?