actions, not words.

Today was a day full of feelings. Whether they were good or bad is an interesting question—there was news in both directions, but they were all of great magnitude, and on the whole it washed out into this general sense of confusion and exhaustion which has now diffused throughout my being. I'm not sure how exactly I feel about it on the whole, but here we are. This morning was generally okay. I was not initially very willing to get up, since the exhaustion that had been building throughout the week was pretty strong at that point already. Eventually, I got out of bed, got ready, had breakfast, and headed out (quickly) to my first class of the day, which happened to be a chemistry exam. On the whole, the exam went mostly okay, but I found myself pushing closer to the time limit, with a full page and a half left to do with 10 minutes left. I got it done though, and we'll see if the grades come out at any point during this weekend. Hopefully they do—after all, the class is relat...

There is a lot of good writing out there, but it is hard to find time to commit to reading to it. (Remember when I planned on finishing a whole set of books at the end of the summer? Since then, I have finished basically zero non-required readings.) There is even less time to sit down and write and reflect on it. In general, I read what is assigned to me, a constant flood of emails from random MIT mailing lists, occasionally Twitter, two AoPS blogs (both of which post inconsistently), and the Guardian's live coverage of British politics. Today (in whatever skewed definition of today  I maintain), however, I got access to another blog and, in combination with the generally contemplative mood a cloudy day sets me in, it took my breath away and sucked my mind into its discussion as I walked alone in the dark across Killian Court and down Dorm Row after my evening class. There is so much content here that I yearn to intake, but unlike my writing, which is methodical and constant and ...

By the time I go to sleep, today will have been a good day.  At the very least, I hope it will have been. Right now, I’m writing this on the top step underneath the columns of Building 10 and the Great Dome, staring out onto the Boston city skyline as the sun prepares to set. It is 6:45 PM, and my next class isn’t until 7:30, in a classroom not too far from here. This is the first time I have taken a purposeful, meaningful break from people in a while, and I suppose that is probably a good thing. This decision, is of course, not without inspiration. I read this post by one of the newest MIT Admissions bloggers and my acquaintance through a variety of math people , CJ, and I am reminded yet again that I am no longer the best (or perhaps even in the top 10%) at anything anymore here. When blogging decisions came out as they did however long ago, I felt sad. What I had perhaps forgotten is my place—at one of the most prestigious universities in the world, people’s abilities are not...

Today was pretty good. Like yesterday, I was perturbed by thoughts and random wakings throughout the night (1:42 AM, for one). I woke up at around 8:30, which I perceived to be a reasonable time to get up, but something inside me felt like it was dying, and, after some extended period of time spent reading and listening to things on my phone, I determined that it was probably reasonable justification for me to go back to sleep for a little while, to see if it was recoverable. I woke up again around 11 and began reading again, feeling much better physically. At this point, my failure to get up was a simple function of my laziness, which does need to be curtailed significantly. Eventually, I rose from the dead, got ready, then read for a while longer before having a relatively light lunch. I read for the brief period after lunch that always seems to be very depressing, and then headed to a coffee shop where I met a friend. We talked about her summer and my summer and all the things w...

Today was a decent day. I attempted to start writing this portion of the post at around 4 PM, after sleeping for around 12 hours, eating lunch, watching some YouTube videos, calling some portion of my RSI friends, and bashing out the problems on the MIT 6.0001 Advanced Standing Exam, which, as far as I can tell, are actually pretty easy, although the lack of feedback given on the actual exam does make me somewhat concerned. Oh well, I'm not too worried about this one. I'm still going to study for 18.02, 5.111, and the biology exam, but we'll see how those go. Concourse actually might prevent me from taking the Chem one, biology seems hard, and 18.02 is a sort of foundational class that it might be bad to miss out on. Interesting. In any case, I failed to actually start writing anything until around 6 PM, when I finally convinced myself to sit down at a desk and type. I had some thoughts after waking up after 12 hours of continuous sleep and yet still feeling all the ene...

A weight settles on my chest, but I do not know where it originates from, nor what it is. Even though my eyes are open, my surroundings are dark, and in the ocean of void I spy little specks of light which I can only assume are stars. My arms and legs are paralyzed, and yet I feel no anxiety, no energy for struggle. Instead, I passively submit myself to the universe, as the lights grow gradually larger, approaching me and overwhelming me in their warmth. The weight stays. Today was a great day. I got up today at 7:20 AM or so, which was around two hours of sleep. Despite this, I was surprisingly awake for the first session of talks (partially a result of Dr. Pepper), and actually managed to enjoy some of the talks then. Then, session two hit. Session two was a 100% math block and the caffeine was wearing off at this point, and so by the time we hit lunch I was about to PTFO. Thankfully, however, it was lunch time, and some of the counselors ran to Sebastian's and back. I watc...

Welcome to this blog! This used to be a daily blog, hence the numbering system; it has moved to be a collection of posts which contain some of my favorite writing. Note that daily posting continues on a different platform—if you'd like access to that, please email me at az23@mit.edu . In any case, here's an even finer selection of some of the posts that I like the most, in chronological order: [Jan 2018] C: Prologue : a prologue to a novella I wrote junior year [August 2018]   1A : a reflection on missing RSI, anxiety surrounding college admissions and the start of my current daily blogging streak [September 2018] 53A : political reflections on the Pledge, Christine Blasey-Ford, and identity politics [November 2018]   112A : discussions about psychological concepts and a tired, tired poem [December 2018]   129A:  the establishment of a personal philosophy interweaved with a good day [December 2018]   131A : getting deferred from MIT, and accompanying in...