First Year Regrets

It’s almost Christmas time and everyone is celebrating the closing of their first year of university life. Well, everyone but me. Comes February 2012, I will still be a first year Arts student. Why? I chose to go part-time this semester, doing only one subject – Choir. For Breath. I might as well have taken leave of absence, for my involvement in scholastic matters was almost inexistent. And while I don’t regret my decision of taking it easy in Semester 2 and working heaps to save some money,  there are many many things I wish I had done differently.

For now, I’ll focus on something that’s always bothering me in the back of my mind: the fact that, so far, I only wrote four times on this blog. Four times. In a freakin’ year. When I was supposed to be blogging once a week. Which would amount to about thirty-eight posts by now. Yeah, not my proudest achievement this year. And what’s ironic is that it was one of the things I was most excited about when Week-O was about to start. Actually, I find that that’s what happened to most of what I was looking forward to. Honestly, I don’t blame uni for it. It wasn’t Melbourne, it wasn’t my course, it was me. First year was a whirlwind I got caught up in and didn’t manage to get out.

I think what I’m taking with me for 2012 – when I’ll be a first year student for only one semester and then I’ll move on to be a chronologically weird, mid year intake-like second year student – is the knowledge that all it takes to blow out a spark is a drop of water. I thought my academic ambitions were more like a forest fire, but boy, was I wrong! You have to really want and love what you’re doing. And even when you think you know what that means, uni life can come and blow it out. Too many readings, essays, new people, deadlines and not enough of your comfort zone.

I found myself longing for Year 12 countless times during the year. I never thought that would happen. Why would anyone want to relive those months of stress and uncertainty and plain fear? Well, at least back then I was in my element. I knew where I was going. What happened with me was that university life (just a synonym for “adult life”, I guess) offered me way too many choices, way too much freedom. I’m not a spontaneous sort of person. I like to have a plan. A five-year plan. A ten-year plan. I love diaries and timetables and putting everything to paper and looking down to see what I will be doing every moment, even when I get lazy and don’t do anything. It’s comforting. But university offers you the world, basically. I think my forest fire turned into way too many sparks, dividing my attention into many different tangents, and they were so weak that soon there was no desire to engage in anything anymore.

And while so far my academic journey is filled with more regrets than achievements, at least they are all life experiences. I happen to like collecting those.

Brenda.