This calls for a warm waffle

This week has somewhat reminded me of a dramatic movie. Plot twists, crushing emotional blows, and deep, startling realizations. And the Terps right now? Not helping.

I write this now as I take a break from watching the CRAP that is the Terps vs. Middle Tennessee on Comcast SportsNet/CSS. The "crap" part refers to both the quality of sports cinematography (oo, big word!) as well as the quality of Maryland's play. Even given the fact that my eyes would probably melt in their sockets if I continued watching the white and blue blobs that are Maryland and MTSU, my new eyes wouldn't be able to survive witnessing the rest of the game anyway. I am in no way a full-out, hardcore football fanatic, but I can see that Maryland is not holding up.

As for this week, I keep finding myself doing that movie moment stare-out-the-window-pondering-life-while-listening-to-soul-reverberating-music kind of thing. Most of this pondering has dealt with the many questions raised during my first days of classes, and the answers seem hard to come by. What do I want my senior year to be like? Am I preparing myself for what's coming after? What do I even want to do afterwards? What happened to those goals I set mid-summer?

What the hell am I doing?

Opportunities keep cropping up that, given a clearer schedule, I would have taken immediately. During my sophomore year, I had wanted to become an official cartoonist for the Diamondback (if you can call the DB official...). Now, when there's a spot open in the paper, I know that the time I would spend drawing would cut into homework, band, or KKPsi.

But being disappointed with my predicament is useless, of course, because my schedule is full of things that I willingly stepped into. That I love. And in this case, sometimes you need to sacrifice one love to be with another. I just hope I'm never asked to make this sacrifice amongst the people in my life.

In other news, the pivotal moment in every college kid's life is coming up for me: the big 2-1 (September 15th!). I'm happy because I'll finally be able to head out to the bars with my friends, but I'm disappointed because it will mean the end of dorm parties and underage excitement. Yes, I was sometimes one of those kids in the booming dorm room down the hall, and those moments were pretty clutch. I guess this is just the passing of another era, and yet another indicator that I'm stepping out of my childhood. Good thing that's not depressing or anything...

Old age and wrinkles aside, I've gotten to know a lot of people during my time at Maryland. They come from every sway of life here on campus, and it's incredibly interesting to see the connections when you step back and look at it all. For me, though, this is almost a problem.

I was never the popular, know-everyone-at-school kid (not to say that I am now). I went through that normal progression in life: a best friend in elementary school, a "posse" in middle school, one or two small gangs in high school. And then college came through, and I was hit with 25,000 opportunities. Band came first, when I spent every waking minute in an oh-so-glorious and confusing early week with 250+ new people. The trumpet section became my first college family. Then came the time when I was released from my band-chains and appeared as a more or less normal freshman on my dorm floor. Everyone on my floor had already bonded, yet I was lucky enough to be included in on some of their floor activities, and eventually became good friends with most of them. 3Cent became my second college family. From there on the list continued to grow: civil engineering friends, aerospace friends, KKPsi and TBS friends, etc.

This wasn't to say that I was suddenly one of those people who knew everyone and would say hi to every living creature on the College Park campus. Because while I met new people and made new friends, my ability to connect with all of them in the same way I had connected with my best friend in elementary school had diminished.

Now I feel almost stretched, and a little unnerved that I won't be able to connect to all those who I would like to be close to. If you've ever spoken to me, you know that words are in no way my strong point. I'm a bit awkward and tend to trip over words if I can get them out in the first place.

It is my hope, though, that my senior year will allow me insight on making the connections I need.

Hope you're all well, and I look forward to blogging for you again soon. A little less on the deep side, maybe? Heh.