Second Year fears

This was supposed to go out around 4/20.

There was a very surreal feeling to returning to Purdue for my second year.  Those who have followed my blog the past several months, since I started telling my story, will know that I ended up attending three different high schools.  Going to Purdue as a Freshman, was my fourth new school in five years.

With my first high school, Mercy, I had hoped to have four good years with my friends before we moved on.  I got two.  My junior year, at the public school, I had the possibility of a second year there.  I wasn't sure whether I wanted that or not, but it was possible.

First cut

The summer between my freshman and sophomore years of college, I had the recurring nightmare that I would be cut from the marching band.  I hadn't marched a show on the field my entire first season, and I wasn't sure which would be worse - knowing I wouldn't be performing all season, or failing the Challenges for every show.

I practiced playing, and tried to work on marching, but I didn't know anybody in South Bend who could help me.  I felt like I was on my own.  Brian was encouraging.  Dear Brother #1 was... not.

Supporting each other

In the last post, I wrote a little bit about our falling in love.  It's frustrating, that so many of the fairy tales and stories that we read, hear, see on television, etc..., so many stories just stop and handwave "happily ever after."  Because I know that the story continues.  That happiness may continue, but it's not a constant.  Nothing is.  Just because you've found someone, does not mean that everything else will suddenly go right.

Finding Brian was the *start*of something right.  But that didn't mean things were perfect, or that all troubles had ended.  I was only in my first semester of engineering school, at one of the top schools in the country.  I'd like to move on to the second semester for next post... but I don't want to sugar-coat college life.  I struggled with a lot of things, things that I think are not unique to me.

I was living in South Bend when the movie Rudy came out.  Everybody loves a happy ending.  But it is an unfortunate fact of life, that everyone has to choose what is most important to them.  In the things that mattered the most to me, engineering and a career that lived my dream, graduating from college was a triumphant success.

In other things that mattered to me... choosing engineering, and those academic pursuits, had a price.

Teenager in love

I was 18 when I started college.  The first week of classes, I noticed that the calculus assignments were work I had done before.  I checked the syllabus, and realized I knew 3/4ths of the material already.  So I went to the Freshman Engineering office, and asked about what I could do.

The advisers their told me that I could test out of that calculus course.  So we scheduled an exam.  I stuck with the class, took the test... and did not pass.  A different adviser gave me the results, and when I explained my concern that I would not do so well in a class where I wasn't challenged, he revealed that I had only missed passing by 5 points, about 1 question.

Rest in peace

Sorry that Monday's post didn't go up until Tuesday.  That was my second scheduling FAIL, I'll try not to let it happen again.

Sometimes it feels like everybody's dying.  One of the biggest factors in my move to Alabama was that my mother and grandmother were dying. I'm not quite ready to relate that story here, just yet. I'd like to write chronologically where I can.