| | One of the things I think I love most about Smith College is the autumn season here: walking to my new classes in a fall jacket and boots, watching the leaves turn pretty shades of orange and red, the friendly pressure of being busy with new clubs and activities before winter sets in. And what a couple of weeks it's been!
Last year, in my first-year here, everything I experienced was so new to me: meeting new people, signing up for new clubs, attending events and traditions I had never experienced before, but I am surprised at how new everything seems this semester too. This is my first year sitting on the Central Board of Gold Key, the tour guide association, and I have loved every minute of managing guides, coordinating events and keeping in touch with admissions staff. We also just finished selecting new guides for this semester ... I am so excited for them! I can just remember how anxious I was to become a guide, and how happy I was when I found out I got accepted. I can just imagine how proud our new guides feel about their accomplishments, and how they cannot wait to represent the best of what Smith has to offer.
This year is also the first year that I am part of the jazz ensemble, and we have our first set of performances this coming weekend during the jazz brunch and Montage concert of Parent's Weekend. My dad and my aunt from Hartford, CT are coming to campus to enjoy the fall weekend with me, and see me perform, but I wish my mom was coming as well (she has to work)... Even though I just went home to New York to see them over Fall Break, I miss my family very much. I would have loved to have my mom see me perform for the first time with the band. I'm not nervous for the concerts at all, however ... although that alto part I have to sing with two of my fellow vocalists could use a little shaping up before Saturday! Still I can't wait to get on stage and show how much I love singing, how much I love jazz, and how much I love performing!
Although fall, my favorite time of year, is in full swing, and I love being busy, fall also means mid-terms. :( I had two mid-term examinations today, and I am very anxious and nervous to see how they turned out. They were in two subjects I had yet to take at Smith - one in Art History and one in Psychology so I didn't know what to expect. I studied a lot, but I started studying late, and so I am uncertain about the results ... still I have faith that everything I have listened to and participated in, in class, with my amazing professors will translate through on the written parts of my examinations.
On another more hopeful note, I have temporarily decided that I am going to declare a Psychology major, Landscape Studies minor, while I contiune to talk to additional faculty members about my self-designed major in Urban Development. Despite what my test score might show in Psychology, I really am interested in the subject matter, and all of the lecturing professors I have heard thus far have been very interesting, competent and engaging. My discussion leader has also agreed to advise me, and I think our personalities will go well together. It's also nice to not have to worry, at least for now about my future academic track ... now I can start looking at study abroad opportunities, and take a little bit of the stress off from trying to get the self-desinged proposal in on time ... I want it to be perfect so I'm not going to rush.
For now, I'm just going to enjoy the rest of the fall foliage, seasonal temperatures, and the excitement and freshness, that for me, fall always embues. |
