Tag: 22-23: Teresa

I’m the type of person who always has to be doing something with their hands– in high school, I had three primary outlets: the first was a hairtie that I’d absentmindedly contort into strange shapes; the second was a lump of putty that I’d squish and squeeze; and the third was a ballpoint pen that I’d spin around my fingers much to the chagrin of many of my teachers when I would accidentally drop it and make a loud sound.  At some point, I decided that I might as well use this restless energy for something productive, and that was how I fell in love with doing crafts (specifically crocheting, but that’s a story for another day).

Because of this, I was instantly drawn to the Made With Love club when I saw their booth at the Anteater Involvement Fair.  It’s basically an arts and crafts club, but with a philanthropic spin, as the club provides a space for members to try out new and different crafts, only for their creations to be donated to a charity.  The event I attended focused on sewing handwarmers (basically bean bags filled with rice that would hold warmth if microwaved).  I’ve only had a little experience in sewing, so it was definitely a learning experience.  But, in the end, I managed to make a functional handwarmer.

I’m sad to say that I finished at 8:30, I had told my ride that I would be done by 8, and in my haste to get home as quickly as possible, I completely forgot to take a picture of my work.  This is unfortunate in some ways (I texted my friends and asked them to wish me luck before I tried a new craft in a moderately high stakes environment and had nothing to show for it after).  But, it’s also a bit fortunate because my handwarmer was not the prettiest thing in the world, so you can all just imagine that it was much nicer than it was.

I had a lot of fun doing it though!  It was nice to leave my comfort zone but stay within the bounds of fun; I feel proud knowing that I could sew something if needed and fulfilled knowing that I was able to contribute to a good cause.

To be entirely honest, going into this school year, I didn’t fully grasp what it meant to be using the quarter system.  I know many think of it as inferior to the semester system, but I’ve always been a big fan of the fact that we start later and have fewer classes to focus on in a fast-paced learning environment.  But, near the end of Week 2, I started to feel some of the downsides of the quarter system, as I had to undergo an unexpected surgery.  I’ve been recovering well and I definitely feel better because of it, but both the surgery and falling behind on classes were definitely a new experience for me.  Fortunately, since it’s still so early in the quarter, I certainly could have missed more – the worst of it was that I missed one discussion and had to do the CS problem sets I procrastinated on in the waiting room – but I learned that though it’s bad to fall behind in general, it’s really bad to fall behind on the quarter system.

With that aside, I have had more fun experiences since the beginning of the quarter.  To avoid letting this get too long, I’ll focus on one: I went rock climbing at the Anteater Recreation Center with a friend and was forced to confront my very real lack of strength.  I didn’t make it to the top of any of the walls because I discovered that after a certain point, my body decided to give up in the fight against gravity and I could no longer pull myself up any higher.  Despite that, I had a lot of fun trying out the different levels and fulfilling all of the different roles (the climber, the person spotting the climber, the backup for the person spotting the climber, the person who takes pictures once the climber reaches the top).

All in all, it’s been a good start!  I’ve been learning things I’m interested in, and there’s enough difference between my classes where it doesn’t feel like all of the work is the same.  I’ve been having fulfilling experiences outside of class, too.  Here’s to hoping the rest of the quarter doesn’t feel like I’m getting tossed around in a washing machine, but I think after surprise surgery in week 2, the only way to go is up.

Hi! My name is Teresa, and I’m quite excited to be a U/U student at UCI. I know that there’s a lot of negative connotation attached to the word “undeclared” (indecisive, doubtful, unsure, unprepared, etc.), but I’ve come to embrace the part of that connotation that is true; I’m 18 and fresh out of a school system where I was basically given a checklist of classes that I had to take in order to graduate. Of course I catered my schedule to my interests and explored new subjects outside of class, but I’m not sure I have the confidence to begin taking an uncertain path only to realize it’s not actually what I want and turn around at the most strenuous point.

With that being said, my current major interests are Computer Science and Language Science; I’m taking classes in both this quarter, and I have confidence that by the end of this quarter, I’ll be able to make a better informed decision about how I want to incorporate those two areas into my college studies. In terms of actual career paths, I’m quite interested in the field of natural language processing as well as cybersecurity, though I do anticipate discovering new interests during my time at UCI.

I’m a commuter from Huntington Beach, though I’m still driving on a learner’s permit, so I probably won’t be driving myself to school this quarter (for the greater good… you don’t want to see me on the road). This has provided a few complications as I need to find a ride for anything I want to go to, but I’m still doing my best to be involved in all the activities that interest me. I hope to share my adventures on the blog!

What else is there to say about myself? I got AirPods right before I graduated high school and they honestly changed the trajectory of my life (nothing hits like using study hall time to work on homework while listening to the Animal Crossing soundtrack on the lowest possible volume out of fear that the sound will bleed and someone else will be able to hear “Bubblegum K.K.”). I’ve always liked to fidget with my hands, and I decided to funnel that energy into learning how to crochet. I’m currently working on making something vaguely like a top (it’s like a shawl or a cover-up) and it involves sparkly white yarn and a cool spiderweb-like mesh pattern. I have an 800 day streak on Duolingo and I live in constant fear that I will lose it one day. I’m mainly learning Korean and Chinese (which I studied in high school), although past ventures have included Spanish and any other mildly interesting language.

I’ve never been good at conclusions, so I’ll leave you with a quote from Lulu Miller’s Why Fish Don’t Exist: “We barely know the world around us, even the simplest things under our feet … we have been wrong before and we will be wrong again. The true path to progress is paved not with certainty but doubt, with being ‘open to revision.’” I hope that in the future I’ll be able to report back with updates on my adventures at UCI!