it’s been a good summer, but it’s time for it to end. yesterday i went through with my annual ritual of going to cocoa beach alone in the morning before the start of fall quarter. the past 3 years it’s been a brief moment of peace and relaxation within which i can focus and ask for god’s blessing on the coming year. this year was no different, and i feel as prepared as ever (which, incidentally, is not very prepared) for autumn quarter.
i’m looking forward to the year with quite more than the usual bit of fear, because there are a number of things that will have to work out just right in order for me to graduate, as i’ve been planning, with two degrees in june. there’s also the fear of thinking about applying to doctorate programs, if i decide that’s what i’m going to do. i picked up an application packet from oxford university when i was there last week, but i haven’t looked at it yet. summer’s not that far gone!
there’s also, of course, a sense of excitement: that good old back-to-school feeling i’ve had ever since elementary school. and while the joy this year will be not so much in supplies and shiny new trapper-keeper notebooks, but in seeing friends and moving into a new apartment, it is a joy nonetheless.
as part of the reflection process i went through yesterday morning, and also last night as i sat in the spa and smoked my peterson standard system 303, i’ve been confronted with things about myself that will have to change if i’m going to have a successful and growthful year. these are, for the most part, the same sorts of things i’ve been confronted with all throughout college, but somehow they’ve evaded my steadfast self-control and escaped eradication (the sarcasm should be obvious there). and yet as i look backwards, my own character flaws and personal failings are more crystallized, more real and thereby more easily laughed at (it’s funny [no pun intended], but i think self-humor is an integral part of the growth process). thus i am hopeful for a year that is successful, not just academically, but also personally, and in my relationships with christ and the beautiful people at stanford (everyone’s beautiful).
so it will be a year of change, if only because i can’t see beyond it: there is no certain “next step”, the way there has been for the past 15 years of my life, and that’s exciting. this also might be the last time i will sit in my house on sunnybrook ct. in orlando, because it’s going up for sale and might be sold before christmas. things are shaking in life, and that’s a place i love to be.
well, now it’s time to go to the airport and board a plane bound for san jose, so here’s to the end of summer, and the start of my last year at stanford! cheers.
