Spring, Social Sciences, and Summing-Up

So much has happened since my last post! I blinked and the second half of senior year has FLOWN by. Only a week and a half of class left. Only three weeks left in total at Puget Sound.

A few things of note happened recently.

I finished the first draft of my thesis. I shut myself away for fifty hours during spring break and wrote and and wrote and wrote. After that, I made the words readable.  Upon turning it in and receiving mostly positive feedback, I congratulated myself by not thinking about Anne Boleyn or King Henry VIII for two whole weeks. I know. It was amazing.

I also got into graduate school! I am henceforth saved from a life spent on my parent’s couch, as I had no other potential plan. This morning, I officially accepted the University of Chicago’s offer of admission to their MAPSS program, or the Masters of Arts Program in Social Sciences, which is a one-year program of study for a Masters degree in Social Sciences. My summer plans are to go home to CA and enjoy sun and the outdoors and being able to read a book the whole way through. History majors read a ton, but we never read books all the way through: we read the beginning, the end, and the most relevant parts in between. Anyway, so I’m looking forward to reading my entire personal library from start to finish.

Finally, and perhaps the most important thing of all, the sun finally came out! It was over seventy degrees this weekend, and it was glorious. Not conducive to getting anything done, of course. I took a nap in the sun and did some reading half-heartedly. No one gets anything done on the first true day of spring. It’s impossible to focus on anything. The sunshine is almost too bright, and you feel restless and like you want to rip off your stiff wintery skin and put on a new fresh, soft one. Needless to say, not ideal weather for doing anything except taking cat-naps and being outside.

Now that graduation is so close, everything seems kind of surreal. Like, oh my gosh, what if this is the LAST TIME I buy a latte from Diversions? What if this the last time I sit with my friends at this table? Ahhhhhhh. *cue existential crisis* Now the memories are starting to bombard me everywhere I go. This is where my friend and I sat in the sun that one time. This is my favorite spot in the library. If I think too hard, I start to panic about time and life changes and leaving all this behind. Did it mean enough? Did I do enough? My experiences here have changed me so much, and I’m so thankful for what I learned, for the opportunities I was given, for what Puget Sound offered.

At the same time, it’s time to leave. SORRY, sorry for the cliché, but it’s true. Time for a new city, a new school, a new challenge. But first: I need to finish my final papers…

This entry was posted in Helen Shears '12. Bookmark the permalink.