![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aamcnamara...good gods, this year. In some ways it's been a hard one, and in other ways it's been an amazing one. It's pummeled me with exhausting research work, bad professors, and difficult classes. I did learn things from all those experiences, but there are some aspects I could definitely have done without.
What I didn't have was much time to breathe. Summer's usually my relaxing time, my time to work on big projects like novels, but this summer I had only snatched moments while on the bus. And yet I still managed to revise A Returning Power and I think it's better than it was. (Not going to risk "much better" quite yet.) Lesson: I might be able to keep writing after I graduate and get a real job?
At any rate, things I did this year:
- Acted in a full-length play (for the first time since, er, eighth grade when I was Oliver Twist in a community production of Oliver!)
- Applied and received offers for summer science research
- Did materials science research for ten weeks at Harvard University
- Figured out that I do not have the necessary commitment to do scientific research
- Did battle with the bureaucracy and fail that was Harvard University's attempt to feed me (and lost)(but, thanks to Kate's family, neither starved nor went to the emergency room)
- Explored Boston and the surrounding area
- Went to WisCon and Readercon
- Applied for, was accepted to, made necessary plans for, and attended Viable Paradise XV (independently enough that I forgot to tell at least one parent about it until the weekend before I left for Martha's Vineyard)
- And hence accumulated a new and excellent group of writer-friends
- Survived my hardest semester of college so far
- Had an awesome and close-knit group of friends (The Mob, Kate, and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
acm28 particularly)
- Baked one million things (no, really, one million) in celebration of having an oven
- Waltzed around a church in the middle of a freak October snowstorm while dressed as a centurion
- Continued to be in a relationship that continues to be awesome (hi, Kate!)
- Stood up for my principles
- Wrote three new short stories and some flash fiction pieces
- Collected more rejection letters
- Revised a novel
...well, when you put it like that...
I continue to believe that the best things in life aren't planned. I do have a few goals for early next year--viz., begin querying agents on A Returning Power and also apply for funding to do history of science research in London next summer--and also next year overall--viz., get my license finally dear god--but they aren't really New Year Resolutions or anything like that.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm still reeling slightly from the notion that I actually revised a novel. Revising A Novel has been such a Big Thing for me for so long that it's weird to think that I, well, just did it. I will probably post more about the whole thing someday.
For now, though, happy New Year's Eve (in this calendrical system)!
What I didn't have was much time to breathe. Summer's usually my relaxing time, my time to work on big projects like novels, but this summer I had only snatched moments while on the bus. And yet I still managed to revise A Returning Power and I think it's better than it was. (Not going to risk "much better" quite yet.) Lesson: I might be able to keep writing after I graduate and get a real job?
At any rate, things I did this year:
- Acted in a full-length play (for the first time since, er, eighth grade when I was Oliver Twist in a community production of Oliver!)
- Applied and received offers for summer science research
- Did materials science research for ten weeks at Harvard University
- Figured out that I do not have the necessary commitment to do scientific research
- Did battle with the bureaucracy and fail that was Harvard University's attempt to feed me (and lost)(but, thanks to Kate's family, neither starved nor went to the emergency room)
- Explored Boston and the surrounding area
- Went to WisCon and Readercon
- Applied for, was accepted to, made necessary plans for, and attended Viable Paradise XV (independently enough that I forgot to tell at least one parent about it until the weekend before I left for Martha's Vineyard)
- And hence accumulated a new and excellent group of writer-friends
- Survived my hardest semester of college so far
- Had an awesome and close-knit group of friends (The Mob, Kate, and
acm28 particularly)- Baked one million things (no, really, one million) in celebration of having an oven
- Waltzed around a church in the middle of a freak October snowstorm while dressed as a centurion
- Continued to be in a relationship that continues to be awesome (hi, Kate!)
- Stood up for my principles
- Wrote three new short stories and some flash fiction pieces
- Collected more rejection letters
- Revised a novel
...well, when you put it like that...
I continue to believe that the best things in life aren't planned. I do have a few goals for early next year--viz., begin querying agents on A Returning Power and also apply for funding to do history of science research in London next summer--and also next year overall--viz., get my license finally dear god--but they aren't really New Year Resolutions or anything like that.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm still reeling slightly from the notion that I actually revised a novel. Revising A Novel has been such a Big Thing for me for so long that it's weird to think that I, well, just did it. I will probably post more about the whole thing someday.
For now, though, happy New Year's Eve (in this calendrical system)!