I wish to start fresh with this journal entry, since I haven't done anything with any of it since sophomore year of college, and I'm now in my senior year. I wish it were my last. Thanks to skipping an important class when I should have taken it and not fighting to get into following classes lead me to get to enjoy another semester or entire year of school extra. If that's not enjoyable enough, this semester is the worst months of my school life to date, thanks to taking 4 studio classes, a core class, and putting time and effort into the school's student-produced magazine, Tempo.

I want to just quit right now.

In other, more positive subjects, over this past summer I was finally able to escape this state and go back to Pennsylvania, where I was born, for a family celebration during the week and weekend before 4th of July. It was my maternal grandfather's 89th birthday that weekend, and my parents and I had not been back to PA in the 14 years we've lived in South Carolina. We had to be there.
It was a great experience seeing the lands I grew up in for 7-8 years or all the places that I've been told about by family. And of course, it was overwhelming getting to see the whole family together and having a good time. My brother and his family could not make it from Hawaii where he's currently stationed (Army), but my cousin James and his girlfriend Suzanne, currently living in Newfoundland, Canada (for architecture, moving to Calgary soon), surprised everyone by showing up to the birthday party. My uncle --his father-- was the only one who knew about his surprise visit, and somehow managed to keep it secret. My oldest cousin and godmother Dawn and her family even came from Chile, where she works for the American embassy, as part of their vacation time. I will be able to cherish all of these moments from that trip for as long as I'm able, because I know seeing so many of us together will be a rare site as the years pass.

Like these wonderful experiences, I wish to embrace the great things that are happening in my life now despite -or perhaps especially because of-- this semester's suffering. There are people in my life right now that are making all the difference in my life every day, whether they realize how much if at all or not. I am a very happy person by nature, but I have been nurtured (not to get psychological, here...) to be so negative and complain about the many things going on. This partly may be due to my graphic design field and its desire to analyze and critique everything visual, whereas my nature is to look and appreciate everything without harsh criticism... at least at face-value and for the first glance. But I don't demean my field of study, because it is opening my eyes to the world of art in a positive way, especially for my career interests. These people suffer through my nurtured self and still find it within them to deal with me.