Hello everyone!
What a whirlwind of a week this was. The whole week I’ve been so disoriented and I was never quite sure which day we were on. I think it was because just last weekend I was at home and that’s thrown off my schedule and sense of place a bit.
Monday was back to business as usual. I had a meeting with the director of the Office of Inclusion and Multicultural Engagement (IME), Angela, on Monday that was really awesome. IME is a really great resource for students at Lewis & Clark to feel supported and represented. I have never really been involved with IME before and it is something I want to become more involved within the coming semesters. I think it’s really important to engage with others and support my fellow students of color at this predominantly white institution. We had our last Community Service and Relations Committee meeting on Monday and celebrated with Thai food.
This week I came down with the cold that has been going around. The mixture of end-of-semester stress and the colder weather has brought the sickness to campus. Luckily I only felt very sick for about a day and then it got better.
My weekend was filled with the performing arts. On Friday I went to see my roommate in her choir concert and then my friends and I also went to see Dance X. Both the choir and dance performances were amazing. I loved seeing my friends dancing and showing off their months of hard work. I am excited to audition next semester for Dance Y, the spring dance show. Then on Saturday night, my friends and I went to see our friend Paige perform with the Oregon Ballet Theater in The Nutcracker. It was so incredibly beautiful to watch all the amazing dancers and have a live orchestra there too. The dancing, music, and beautiful set combined to create the most wonderful show.
This coming week is the last week of the semester which is totally insane. I feel like this entire semester didn’t even happen. NSO feels like it was just the other week. We only have three days of classes this week and then reading days. Finals start on Saturday (off Sunday) and go through Wednesday. I only have two tests and one of them is open-notes so I am not too worried. I plan on putting a lot of time and effort into studying for them so I can do well. In my International Political Economy class, we have the Economist essay that we have been working on for the past few weeks due next Sunday. After we turn them in, we get to have a gathering where we read each other's work and celebrate our hard work so I am really looking forward to that.
I fly back home late on December 18th because I have my last final that afternoon. I am looking forward to this month-long break. I am planning on spending time with family and friends and probably working a little bit too.
As I reflect on this semester I have had a great semester overall. It has felt both so short and so so long. In some ways, I think that this semester has felt sedentary because there aren’t as many new things (now that I am not a first-year) to experience and I am much more at ease socially. My highlight of the semester was probably going on the College Outdoors climbing trip to Smith Rock because I got to try something new, meet new friends, and have a rockin’ weekend. My low for the semester was having the Tanzania study abroad program that I had been looking forward to for a long time be cancelled due to low numbers. I felt like my whole plan for the rest of my college career had been derailed. However, something good still came from the sadness because I moved to the SE Asia (Thailand) program and it will be amazing too, just different. Next semester I am really looking forward to many things: I am taking the bouldering class so I am excited to get better at climbing; I just became the new acting Community Service and Relations Coordinator for ASLC (our student government) so I have taken on a lot of new tasks and responsibilities and I am excited and nervous for the work ahead; I am on a new committee to create a new first-year experience at LC so I am excited to see how that evolves next semester; I am really excited for the weather to be warm and beautiful again (even if I have to wait until April) - I know that once the sun comes out in the spring everything will be alright; and I am just super excited for another new start, new classes, and the new people I’ll meet along the way.
There have been so many wonderful people I've met and things that have happened this semester. I could not be more grateful.
Have a wonderful day and end of 2019.
Sarah