Rollercoaster States, Classes, and Adaptation.

Note to self, and all of you: keeping a journal is extremely helpful for remembering all that goes on during a week. I probably wouldn’t have been able to effectively write this blog post without it.

So it’s been longer than I intended since I last wrote, and for that I’m a little nonplussed with myself. Then again, a lot has happened and I’ve been incredibly busy with all the various facets of college. So here’s the weekly recap. As a LOT has gone on, it’ll probably be longer than most later posts.

The first couple of days here tended to follow a bit of a rollercoaster-esque pattern, as there would be ups and downs of good times and awkward ones throughout the day. I’d go from hanging out with my friends and having a great time to feeling somewhat odd because I wanted to meet people but felt like I couldn’t break into their giant groups. I mostly hung out with the friends I’d known in high school; of course I made other friends, but we didn’t really communicate much beyond exchanging numbers when we met and hanging out for the few hours we were together. There were highlights, though: a trip to the International District with one of my best friends and a few other kids where we unexpectedly found some sort of exhibition for sustainability plans for the city; a massive game of Apples to Apples that my friend and I were invited to and where I finally felt like I was getting involved here; meeting a new friend with a number of similar interests and opinions at an otherwise uneventful kick-off for new students. But generally it was a strange mix of some exciting and some disappointing.

That changed, however, on Monday when I went to a pizza party for the kids in my tower of the residence hall and met a few other people. That was fun, but the real turnaround came later that day when I headed to a concert the university had put on. My floor’s RA had sent out an email saying he would be taking a group of kids from our floor there, and so I decided to go. That was probably the best decision of the past week or so: I met a massive group of new people, including a fellow IB kid and aerospace engineer, and hung out and enjoyed music with them for the four-ish hours of the concert. The first two bands weren’t two great, but the third one–Allen Stone–was definitely the perfect choice for the headliner; at one point one of his songs inspired the kids in the very back to link up with their arms across each others’ shoulders and start swaying back and forth, which gradually flowed forward until the entire crowd was one mass of swaying, happy students. The same thing happened with the very last song played, one from the Civil Rights Movement, and was played as an encore. Coming together through the power of soul music, indeed.

After that was a late-night shopping trip, put on by the university, that I headed to with three other kids from the floor. The two-hour wait in line was pretty fun, the shopping was crazy, and the bus sing-alongs to Miley Cyrus, Taylor Swift, and the Pokemon theme song provided plenty of traveling entertainment. The rest of the night was spent hanging with my new friends in their rooms–apparently there had been a corner of incredibly social people on the other side of the hall, where I couldn’t see, which explained my loneliness. But now I’d found them, and life was grand.

The day after was similarly great and filled with people: I got books with the floor buddies, got a new Japanese horse poster to brighten up my desk space, and hung out with a large group from the floor after getting a hot dog at the residence hall barbecue (and I mean literally just a hot dog, they ran out of buns). The day really showed how I’d been very quickly accepted and liked by my new friends: they joked with me when I returned bearing only one sad hot dog and basically expressed how I had really needed to wait a long time and that, basically, they’d waited for me and kind of missed me. After the strange feelings of those first few days, it was pretty nice. Plus I found a friend who is also an aero engineer and loves drawing, like me, so that was awesome.

The next two days were kind of…interesting. Classes were generally fine, but I had an adventure with my elective, a class about technical drawing and CAD. I had been warned that it could be a very labor and time-intensive class, but I had figured I could handle it. But after my first two classes–a chemistry class that seemed pretty doable and a calculus class that had looked very intense and fast paced–as I walked into a classroom mostly filled with upperclassmen guys, I suddenly realized that maybe this hadn’t been the best choice. As the professor began lecturing about terms I had never before heard and detailing the labs and work we would be doing, I started to become afraid. I almost started crying out of fear of the workload I had taken on in my first quarter of college. So I ran to the engineering advising office and ended up speaking to the kindest, sweetest, most understanding woman ever. She completely understood my situation, agreed that I had chosen a very heavy workload for my first quarter, and helped me to drop the technical drawing class and change to a much easier one about volcanoes, as well as a seminar she ran that essentially just helped engineering women with their homework twice a week, I ended up drained at the end of that day and could barely focus on my work, but at least I now had a much better schedule.

The second day was decent: I only had one “class”, a math section that was fun because I knew a lot of the people in it, and afterwards I hung out with a number of friends at the student activities fair and went dorm-hopping and such. I also found a nice study spot in the library that I have now decided is my spot: it’s got just enough noise to not be awkward or creepy or anything, but is also quiet enough for me to actually focus in, and it’s backed up against some bookshelves so I can look out at everything. After doing some homework I went to two events: a computer science and engineering new student welcome (as I had randomly gotten direct admission to the CSE program here) and a Society of Women Engineers info session. I’m not going to describe them in a large amount of detail, but suffice to say that, from both of these awkward experiences, I learned that 1) probably the largest concentration of the absolute weirdest people of any engineering field go into computer science and engineering, and 2) apparently college students have no presentation skills whatsoever, which is honestly pretty sad. I mean, the information was good, but the SWE women who were giving the presentation really did not do a great job, which is really unfortunate. So once again it was another tiring day, and I went home pretty much exhausted.

Friday was pretty similar, with not much super exciting. After attending it for the first time, my volcanoes class does seem very awesome, however, so I’m excited for that and the welcome change it brings from my math and science-heavy schedule. I had planned to hang out with my family on Saturday and head up to my house to grab some more things, then come back down with them (they were going to the WSU Cougars game in Seattle) but unfortunately I found out that no buses run near my house on Saturdays, so I ended up getting picked up Friday night. It was nice, though: I got free, good dinner, plus the chance to sleep in my own bed and really sleep in in a nice quiet environment. Plus I got a delicious omelette and scones in the morning, The afternoon was full of hanging out and showing them around the UW in the pouring-down rain, but hey, family bonding time. I determined that it was a lot easier getting along with your family when you don’t live with them, because your time together becomes less of a chance for them to nag and more of time to catch up on everything that’s been going on. So I’m happy about that.

I was pretty sad to see them go, but just as I was unlocking my door to get back into my room, I saw some friends heading down the hall who told me that the crew (which was what we’ve taken to calling our friend group) was going to head out to dinner soon, and asked if I wanted to come (which I of course did). What followed was an entertaining romp to a dinner place close to our dorm, which booted us out at 8, and then an adventure to get frozen yogurt a little ways off campus. Then was an inception-style movie night, where we watched both Pitch Perfect and then The Breakfast Club, with both movies provided by yours truly. Today was pretty similarly chill: sleep, free food by crashing a barbecue, homework for a few hours, dinner at a really delicious sausage joint nearby, and a hot chocolate party with a few kids.

So that’s been it: the past week of getting used to college. The first three days of class were definitely a little weird, with all of us trying to figure out what classes to stick with and how to balance a social life with class and homework, but I know we’ll get better at it as we adapt to our new life. At least, I know I will.