A Template

Even before my 4th college year started, I felt as if I was already finished with Berkeley. Sadly, I didn't anticipate the same excitement that I'd experienced during grade 12. Rather, the unsavory prospect of truly growing up and working didn't make me very happy.

A lot of kids are going to continue on to graduate studies, but for me, I neither qualify for the program I want, nor do i have the stamina to power through another 2+ years. But why did I even care about pursuing a master's or Ph.D. anyways? Probably for the supposed pay increase or the ability to look cool when introducing my qualifications. As a result, I sometimes find that I betray my own desires to follow the template that the community lays out for me to see. I have so much interest in learning, but now, I feel like the UC is not the right environment for me. The pressure, competition, and environment threaten me to work hard, rather than inspire me. Come May, and I'll have my own diploma boasting my four years of hard work. But why do I still feel a bit discouraged?

But why does it feel like my life is over? I'm resentfully acknowledging the fact that the next 30 years of my life (if I live that long) is going to accelerate to really high speeds, and not in a good way. Instead, it's the curse that so many adults warn you about, that your time after college is just going to fly by...as if it hadn't flown by already. I remember sitting in my 12th grade government class soon after my college acceptance letters had come in the mail. I closed my eyes tight and pretended that I was in my final year of college, trying really hard to imagine the feelings of pride and nostalgia that I'd be feeling at that point. Then, I opened my eyes, relieved that I had somehow traveled back to the high school for a second chance to have fun.

Why is it that time flies for so many people? I think I've known all along. When i start my first generic job, I'm not gonna have many opportunity to tell my boss I'm gonna go to Singapore for a 6 months, nor am I going to be able to tell him that I want to ride a motorcycle across the states, just cause it's my dream... or can I? I think that time flies by in an adult's working world because we don't have cycles anymore. Falling in the repetitive routine of the middle class working world blurs the years together with no end in sight. Right before I ended my summer job, an full-time engineer told me, "Wow, you're leaving huh? I can't even imagine what it'd be like to have a 'last day of work.'" Hearing that comment didn't make me happy. Throughout the past 20 years, there have been blatant checkpoints to remind us that every year has been an accomplishment: numerous graduations, new classes, new schools, new sports, summer vacations, first kisses, and finally, the right to buy alcohol. I didn't want to subject myself to decades of continuous redundancy only to ask myself at the end where all those years went.

So what has made me happy in Berkeley? Definitely not the bulk of my coursework. Theta Tau, since the beginning, has helped me grow. Even when we started out as a questionably useless organization, we developed into a legitimate presence, and I'm glad to have been intimately involved in that. Danceworx, surprisingly, was a rewarding, new experience and I'm amazed I'm actually still doing it for a 4th semester (not that I've improved that much at all). ME104 gave me the opportunity to have an actual relationship with an excellent professor, even though that relationship is rather underdeveloped. You'd think thousands of students in your midst everyday would give you tons of friends, but most of the people I've become acquainted with simply remain acquaintances. The drinking nights with the close friends are what really made me happy. Getting bad grades made me feel disappointed only because I felt average compared to a lot of the other ME dorks, but I've learned to be satisfied with my best performance.

Of course, my responsibilities still require that I wisely utilize my skills to earn money, but I'd rather do it in an unconventional way, one that gives me a friendly "memo" every year or so to remind me to stay away from the dangers of a cyclic lifestyle. There so much I still want to learn and I don't think Berkeley can provide that for me any longer.

I think I still need to create my own bucket list and follow my own path to distinguish society's expectations for me with my personal goals. So, is my life over? Definitely. But now's my chance to close my eyes, think ahead, and start a new one.