Summer Daze. I guess this summer has been one of several realizations amidst the doldrums that were day-to-day life. It's been a tremendous lesson in responsibility, living on my own in an apartment and having to cook and clean up after myself, not to mention taking care of bills and whatnot.

I guess most importantly, I've decided that I'm not ready for grad school yet at this point in my life; I don't have the drive and the dedication for it in my current state right now. I was pretty disappointed in myself at how unpassionate I was about my research material- computational structural dynamics. Seeing as how this was the area that I had previously envisioned myself pursuing graduate study in, my future plans have suddenly required a bit of rethinking. I guess I just really disappointed myself with how much I struggled with this work and how little I feel like I accomplished. It all just felt like a very unrewarding experience, and I guess it kinda soured the whole research thing for me.

I'm still searching for some sense of identity and that feeling of belonging. I don't know what I'm doing with my life, and I certainly don't know where I'm going. I'm not really happy, but I'm not truly sad either... things are just... [whatever]. Some kinda quarter-life crisis, I suppose. I'm really hoping my semester abroad will help me put some perspective on things. Since mid-last semester, I've just been pushing to make it through till then, suffering through this bleehhhhhhh that passes for life these days. I've been drinking a lot these days, and I know that's never the solution for anything, but it does make certain times so much more bearable. I do worry about my liver sometimes though. =/

I did rather enjoy living in Austin without having to go to school, though. It allowed for a lot more introspection than I could have accomplished back home in Plano. Maybe it's that sense of boundless freedom, or that carefree feeling that I wake up with at 3 in the afternoon, lying in bed staring at the ceiling... the kind of stuff that makes you feel infinite. And while life on the whole is not picture perfect, it's those tiny moments, those blinks of an eye that make me feel at peace, ever so temporarily... like the eye of the hurricane that is my mixed up life these days. Okay, but enough with the tired cliches- the summer was definitely memorable, but I would have done many things differently given the chance. I remember the barbecues, midnight food runs, the 4 or 5 birthdays I helped celebrate, forming new friendships and rekindling old ones, getting whomped at muay thai, edge-of-my-seat anime action, and the first-time feeling of truly taking care of myself. Can't say I accomplished everything I would have liked to, but I've got something to chew on I guess.