I feel a little phony titling this so enthusiastically…the words evoke images 
of playfully running along a beach in a bikini with polka-dots on it, of hiking and biking through the woods in khaki shorts, of laughing with pals while toasting hot dogs over a fire, and all-in-all not letting a precious second of that beautiful summer weather go to waste while looking like some kind of preppy stereotype or advertisement for a pharmaceutical product that will allow the patient to still lead a full life.
Now, I’m not saying that I don’t plan to wring every drop of enjoyment I can out of this summer break…I have been looking forward to this vacation so hard my eyes hurt. Well, also, I need new glasses, but a lot of it is from 
vacation anticipation.
It’s just that none of those above mentioned activities reflect my plans for perfect summer bliss…I may at some point be forced to do one or two of them (I think Briggs has us down for hiking with his sis at some point) but on the days when I’m my own activities director, I have very firm plans that, overall, do not include going out in the stupid sun. Or even out of the safety of the house.
I am going to write. I am going to draw. I am going to color some of the line art languishing on my hard drive. I might allow myself, hissing and snarling at the unfriendly daystar as it irradiates my pallid skin, to be coaxed as far as Anna’s house to drink coffee before retreating to gloom of my room and the glow of my monitors.
I honestly tingle with joy at the thought.
And, at some point I will dress up fancy and go see Les Miserables at the Benedum.
Well, I suppose it goes without saying, after that ode to gothy behavior, that I have finished my quarter.
I’m really glad. This quarter sucked. Not because of bad classes — just the opposite. I actually had two classes I really liked and wanted to do well in. The problem was that I wasn’t. I was stressed out and not very focused this quarter…I was burnt out and wanting to work on projects that felt creative…I was experiencing anxiety attacks. I know I wasn’t doing my best work, and I just couldn’t quite get myself up to par this quarter, especially in the two classes I really cared about.
This quarter made me feel stupid and untalented and I’m glad it’s over.
I need some time to decompress and work on some of my own projects and improve in the areas that AIP keeps frustratingly skittering past and around without actually focusing on. I want to draw and get better at drawing, maybe reach a point where I’m less inclined to beat my head against the wall after every sketching session.
My final tally for the quarter:
Graphic Illustration — I might get an ‘A’, might get a ‘B’…this is the class I am super annoyed with myself for because this is the class that a) is taught by one of the actual illustration teachers and b) began with that teacher telling me he had heard good things about me and expected really good work. I didn’t give it to him. It sucks even more ’cause he had high expectations and the work I did was sub par — both in terms of my own standards and of the output of my classmates — insult to injury, I was doing crappy work in a class full of extra-talented people. *sigh*
English 2 — A ‘B’. I hope. I never scored higher than a ‘B’ on any of my in class essays, but never lower than that either. There are, however, a few variables that have yet to be accounted for: my research paper, my take-home essay, my extra-credit poem and my final exam. I am not optimistic about my final exam. I don’t think I have just been a ‘face in the class’ in English since 3rd grade. I’m used to my English teachers doting on me. That did not happen in this class. I DID learn and had an awesome teacher, but not being roundly acknowledged as the class protege was frustrating to say the least. But then again, I dealt with that a lot this quarter.
Photoshop 2 — Eh. I think I did okay. Again, ‘A’ or ‘B’. I got my website design project back today with a ‘B’ but I also got my Ariel Atom picture back with ‘A+’s in every category and ‘Excellent!’ scrawled across the bottom of the grade sheet. This class I am relatively indifferent about. I mean, I sure hope I got an ‘A’, but…whatever.
Economics — I might actually get an ‘A’ in Econ. I didn’t necessarily agree with everything we were taught, I found the subject horribly depressing and it just compounded my belief that people are generally either jerks or suckers or both. However, the teacher was funny and pretty cool, and having grown up in (communist) China, he didn’t have a USA-centric view of the world, which was cool. Anyway, I got ‘B’s on a couple quizzes, but aced the rest and the final was not hard. I am hopeful. Also, somewhat indifferent. I care about my GPA overall, but I’m not going to business school. If my Economics grade doesn’t blow my future employers out of the water, so what?
Now, I am off to enjoy that wonderful feeling of being able to sit on my butt and goof without feeling guilt for neglected projects. And eat cow heated over fire. Hell yeah.
