Auld Lang Syne

"I just want to take life as it is. Better it where I can, but not get tied up in the things I absolutely have no power to change. So instead of a New Year's resolution, I'll start a new tradition. I have a empty Pirouette can in my dorm room and I'm going to fill it up with little slips of paper. On these pieces of paper are going to be written things that happen to me during days of 2015 - good, bad, funny, everything I will think was significant about that day."
     ~Ring in 2k15

Last New Years (last last year, in 2014), I made a resolution that I followed pretty diligently throughout 2015. I promised myself that each time something noteworthy about my day happened, I would write it down on a slip of paper and put it in a jar. One year later, I have a large pile of folded slips in front of me, documenting things as far back as January 2015 - a time that seems ages ago to me now.

I've already gone through the whole pile, and now recall a lot of small things that happened to me ages ago, things I would've forgotten had I not written them down. Things I would've hated to forget had I not written them down.

I've compiled these days below, with red dates being especially memorable:

*Brackets are edits, either to add things I remember/enhance comprehension, or to protect identities*

• 1-1-15: Went for a horse ride at [Dude Ranch] where my family spent New Year's.
• 1-2-15: Cousins, aunt, and Nana played Loaded Questions, I used the awful Lincoln joke [If historical characters had Twitter, what would they tweet? "Wife dragged me to another show again. #bored #shootme"] and was voted most funny. Aunt, who is a nurse, took the game too literally [What would you use to replace an amputee's limb? "A medically-certified prosthesis of the highest caliber."]
• 1-4-15: Went out with Captain Obvious, [HS Friend #2], [HS Friend #3], and [HS Friend #3's little sister]. 
• 1-9-15: Arrived [at college dorm]. Friendly man on bus asked for a pen. Tree outside window still has some leaves.
• 1-16-15: Staying over in [College Friend #1]'s room tonight. [She lived in a different dorm than I did.]
• 1-18-15: A (senior) student stopped me on way back from Quidditch and asked if I believe in heaven/God. Told her I'm atheist-agnostic, and I think there's no heaven. She took it very nicely. Not all Christians are a**holes.
• Saw the girl who stood in line with me and [College Friend #2] at PTV concert last December at the movies today. Never thought I'd see her again.
• 1-20-15: Turned in first Island and Marine Ecology homework today, got kudos because I was the only one with citations.
• 1-21-15: Found out [HS Classmate #1] is in my Geography class. Large campus my a**.
• 1-25-15: Two new members in Quidditch, one just approached us and joined in as we were practicing.
• Started watching Supernatural, [My College] is mentioned, except they said [it a different way than locals do].
• 1-26-15: [Friend] asked for advice to break up with [Other Friend].
• Attended a rush meeting for an Asian sorority.
• 1-27-15: The religion lady from last time stopped me again. Told her she already stopped me before, but she [didn't recognize me and] wanted to keep talking.
• 1-29-15: Saw a dude with a horse head on today, casually walking. Wore a black trench coat, too.
• 2-2-15: I feel that [College Friend #1] is becoming a better friend than [College Friend #2].
• 2-4-15: Assigned to the Ukraine Separatists group in Geography recitation debate. Boo.
• 2-9-15: Went to look at townhouses. Found out I can sublet :)
• [Chem Lab Partner #1] showed me how to order my first Grab-N-Go burger.
• 2-13-15: Friday the 13th!!!!!
• [College Friend #2] is very perceptive, asked if I was okay.
• 2-20-15: Sent my Owl City Photoshop movie to dad, he forwarded it to, like, EVERYONE (it has more views now though).
• 2-24-15: [For Bio Lab I got to measure the blood pressure of [Extremely Attractive and Funny Partner with Nice Biceps]]. Had to have my blood pressure measured by [E.A.F.P.N.B] too. With sweaty pits [because we were measuring blood pressure before and after exercising, and I was wearing a tank top].
• 2-27-15: Finished and uploaded my first mashup to YouTube, after [working on it] for a week.
• 3-5-15: Made vegan "Coral Reef" cake in Island and Marine Ecology.
• 3-13-15: Friday the 13th!!!!!
• Went for my 2nd, better boba here with [Biology Lecture Friend].
• Had a funny sarcastic conversation with the popcorn guy at "Cinderella" today.
• 3-20-15: Got tix to Echosmith!! (Ironic how I originally got tickets to see Echosmith, but by the day of the concert I was a raving twenty one pilots fan.)
• 3-31-15: [Island and Marine Ecology Professor] really liked my drawing of a moorish idol.
• 4-2-15: Saw Bo Burnham in person on his "Make Happy" tour. "Wouldn't've Got the Lettuce If I Knew It Wouldn't Fit."
• 4-7-15: I have turf burn on my knee, a cut on my knuckle, and conjunctivitis since Monday [for two days] [From rubbing my eye too hard and smearing makeup into it].
• Grandpa passed away.
• 4-8-15: Went in to get eye drops for conjunctivitis, [made to wait a long time, ended up leaving without drops], and was late to Geography recitation's GMO debate.
• 4-11-15: Extremely nice (and cute) server at Five Guys. [Crush #2] discovered I wear glasses.
• 4-17-15: Heard old man at Target say, "Excuse me b****." I turned around, and his finger was pointing an inch from my face. I said, "Excuse me?" and he turns around and walks off.
• 5-2-15: Went to Cinco de Mayo fair at [College Friend #1's Home Town] with [College Friend #1] and [College Friend #3].
• 5-11-15: Started internship, met [Intern #1].
• 5-16-15: Helped euthanize a mallard. First witnessed death at internship.
• 5-26-15: [Head Staff in Recovery] liked that I wasn't a clingy intern always asking for things to do.
• 5-27-15: Met my neighbor's new Corgi puppy Chowder.
• Dad finally returned my Nintendo DS Lite [after 4 years].
• 5-29-15: Went to 3 auto body shops to get estimates on fixing dent in my car.
• Went dress shopping with [HS Friend #1] for contra, got black with pink roses.
• Confessed a lot to [HS Friend #1] about [Crush #1] and [Crush #2]. When told that [Crush #2] had asked me to visit him over the summer, she really pushed me towards doing that. (2016 Update: I didn't).
• 5-30-15: Visited Captain Obvious with [HS Friend #1] for dinner and contra dancing. Very dizzying. Cute guy in black [galaxy] shirt with freckles. [Friend pushed me to say hi; when I didn't she did it herself.]
• 5-31-15: Cute volunteer at my internship remembered my name. (Really? You wrote THIS down?)
• [Staff Member] liked the snitches I painted on my new scrubs.
• 6-4-15: [HS Friend #1] bailed on Bake Day because of her brother's dinner party.
• Started cleaning out my papers and read a lot of old journals from [Elementary School]. Taught my mom Mario Kart.
• 6-6-15: Babysat Chowder for first time.
• 6-9-15: Laughed too hard at work; [Staff Member] commented, "Sounds like you guys are having too much fun..."
• 6-13-15: Went to [local mall] with Captain Obvious to get scrubs.
• 6-18-15: Emergency called [into internship] on Friday to open Recovery [without guiding staff] and it went great.
• 6-20-15: Went to San Francisco to look for secret parks with Captain Obvious.
• 6-21-15: No one showed up in Courtyard, so I opened it and trained 2 volunteers by myself.
• 6-23-15: Cleaned all raptor condos in Recovery in a little over an hour - praise from [Head Staff in Recovery]!
• 6-24-15: Taught Chowder "roll over," when [Owner] has been trying forever.
• 6-29-15: Caught a sparrow in midair [as it tried to fly away] - "cat reflexes." [Intern #1] and [Intern #2] saw.
• 6-30-15: Praise from [Internship Boss] and [Head Staff in Recovery] on great screech owl setup in the pavilion. 
• 7-4-15: Taught Chowder to "play dead."
• 7-5-15: Opened and closed Courtyard [at Internship] all by myself.
• 7-14-15: Took home a vole to foster - [Intern #2] suggested I call it Vole-demort.
• 7-17-15: Went in on wrong day to show around new volunteers. Vole-demort nearly died from aspiration.
• 7-19-15: [Internship Boss] pulled me into his office to tell me I'm one of the favorite interns.
• 7-26-15: Last day of internship, day of final [test]. Took 5 hours to complete because [Intern #3] and I kept talking. [Staff Member] said she would miss our early mornings working together.
• 7-31-15: Showed new volunteers around [Place of Internship]. First group didn't show up, second group only had 2 shows. 
• Released Vole-demort to Mills Canyon.
• 8-1-15: Went to a Renaissance Faire with [HS Friend #4], [HS Friend #4's Boyfriend], [HS Friend #5], and [Friend of HS Friends #4 and #5]. Got sunburned shoulders.
• 8-4-15: Took Amtrak to Santa Barbara. Saw Grandpa's desk calendar still open to April on his desk; he had written "[My Name]'s Birthday" in the 15th's box.
• 8-5-15: Walked Zoe [Dog of Grandparent's neighbor], very good running buddy.
• 8-8-15: Took Amtrak home from Santa Barbara; cheated out of my window seat by an underage girl with preferential treatment. Got Skittles. 
• 8-11-15: Last day at [Internship]; ran into [HS Classmate #2] at CVS. Bleached my hair.
• 8-12-15: Bleached and dyed my own hair [blue], [couldn't book a stylist].
• 8-14-15: [After leaving in hair dye], finally washed out dye after 3 [days]. No spare dye washed out. Brightest color yet.
• 8-17-15: Lit a bunch of candles with apartment roommates to celebrate moving in
• 8-18-15: Got textbooks with [College Friend].
• 8-19-15: Bought spearmint seeds and planted.
• 8-22-15: Went to WelcomeFest [concert put on by university]. Saw Joywave and Seven Lions.
• 8-26-15: First time I recognized a panic attack as a panic attack.
• 8-28-15: Found a woman's journal/sketchbook/diary in a shopping cart, filled with collages and amazing doodles. Called the number under the name, was returned.
• 8-31-15: [Boy from Music Class] asked me for my number in note form. Gave it to him, he's constantly texting to hang out. Severe regret. I discover that I must know the person a bit before I'm willing to hang out.
• 9-1-15: Girl in Chem lab has the exact same Guess combat boots as me. Had to run back to apartment between classes to get lab goggles.
• 9-3-15: Saw a girl with with jeans and just a strapless bra on, walking around campus in the morning; she wrote "Still not asking for it" on her chest and stomach.
• 9-4-15: Saw a guy with a PTV shirt and a girl with a The Ready Set shirt.
• Ate my first edible. No effect but a placebo one.
• 9-7-15: Got twenty one pilots and Echosmith tickets in the mail.
• 9-9-15: Saw a dude with a twenty one pilots shirt.
• 9-10-15: Ran into [College Friend #3] randomly at the library, first time I'd seen him since semester started.
• 9-17-15: A wasp flew into my boobs.
• 9-21-15: Studied Chemistry from 7 PM to 1:30 AM with [Chem Lab Partner #2].
• 9-22-15: Studied again from 3 to 7 PM before the test, only got [bad grade :( ] on test.
• 9-24-15: Went to the [College Town] Creek area for Ecology lab, lots of grasshoppers around, and winterberry bushes.
• 9-27-15: Saw twenty one pilots.
• 9-29-15: Submitted study abroad application, waiting on course proposal email.
• 9-30-15: Panic attack in religion class, when I said "jaguar" instead of "leopard" when answering what Dionysus's animal was.
• 10-1-15: Ecology partner very terse today, snapped and said, "You don't have to be so rude." Confusing and frustrating.
• 10-2-15: [College Friend #1]'s birthday today. I and the other two roommates bought a 2 ft. diameter pizza and baked red velvet cupcakes for her.
• 10-8-15: Saw girl from last semester's Chem lab, waved hello. She recognized me still!
• 10-13-15: Saw the girl who kept standing up on the bus to TØP concert when walking to Chem recitation.
• 10-16-15: Saw my old Chem TA at supermarket. She recognized me still! We talked for a bit.
• 10-22-15: Forgot my umbrella in Ecology lab, too shy to go back to get it, will wait for next week.
• 10-25-15: Dyed my hair blue again.
• 10-27-15: Accidentally played my music without the jack fully inserted for a few seconds when walking home. New paranoia whenever I plug in my earbuds now.
• 11-6-15: Religion classmate brought her sister to my religion class.
• Walked by a girl on the phone who said, "Ciao mama, come stai?"
• 11-7-15: Collected data with Ecology lab parter at a ponderosa pine area that had received burn treatment.
• 11-18-15: Stranger man walked by and complimented my new computer decal.
• 11-21-15: Burned my finger making cookies for a potential roommate for next semester; too bad they never showed.
• 11-24-15: I stayed in [College Town] for Thanksgiving while my roommates drove home. I got a text from [College Friend #2] this morning saying "You're going to be at the apartment right? I ordered takeout to you. It's already paid for and tipped. Happy Thanksgiving!"
• 12-5-15: Bought a Christmas tree and ornaments. Had so much fun decorating it with personalized memento baubles, photographer roommate took Polaroid pictures and we decorated tree with the film. 
• 12-14-15: Went with [College Friend #1] and [College Friend #2] to get free breakfast at night, sponsored by the university. Only received a crappy breakfast burrito.
• 12-15-15: Finals cancelled today because of snowstorm. Saw a guy get his car stuck in the snow; a stranger came over to try to help tow it out, failed; his friends came out to help him dig it out. Roomies and I, spying, all cheered, "Sqaaaaaad!" when they did.
• 12-18-15: Shipped possessions back to home town. Tried to marathon Star Wars with [College Friend #2], but sound quality was weird, ended up watching "Sherlock" instead.
• 12-19-15: [College Friend #2] drove me and suitcase to campus so I didn't have to trek uphill to return my textbooks. On bus ride to airport, I saw a dude giving a barefoot girl a piggyback ride.
• Just so happens that [College Friend #3] got on the same bus to the airport, didn't plan it. When he checked in, we discovered we were also departing at the same gate (his flight was right after mine).
• 12-21-15: Visited [Place of Internship] today. Very slow day, but met all the old volunteers again. High-fived [Head Staff in Recovery]. 
• Picked up my cousin from airport, she is staying with us instead of flying back to China for Christmas.
• 12-22-15: Drove down to Santa Barbara.
• 12-22-15: Drove down to Los Angeles to join the rest of my family.
• 12-29-15: Visited Getty Villa, a mansion styled after the Villa of Papiri in Herculaneum. Was able to guess about 30% of the time who the statues were before reading the caption. Recognized a statue of Cybele as the one my religion professor showed us in class. I saw it in person!
• 12-31-15: Spend New Year's at home watching the New York ball drop.

I was complimented on my dyed hair 42 times throughout the year.

I had 6 breakdowns over Chemistry (math) this year, concentrated in February and March.

I cried over anxiety problems 11 times this year, concentrated in January and February but with outliers in October.

Perhaps it's a coincidence, but I notice these breakdowns happened more often when I slept alone in a room.

---

2015 Musical Favorites:

• Motley Crew, by Thomston 
• "Overcrowded and lonely / Dysfunctional in every way."
• Above the Clouds of Pompeii, by Bear's Den
• "Just don't cry / Hold your head up high / She would want you to."
• Holding On To You, by twenty one pilots
• "You think twice about your life / It probably happens at night, right?"
• Props & Mayhem, by Pierce the Veil
• "I'm gonna light up this place, and die in beautiful stars."
• Geronimo, by Sheppard
• "We can make this leap / Through the curtains of the waterfall."
• I Luv This S***, by August Alsina
• "I'm way too young to be living like this."
• Guns For Hands, by twenty one pilots
• "You all have guns / And you never put the safety on."
• Anaesthetic, by Thomston
• "Living on anaesthetic / No one seems to get it."
• Youngblood, by Jem and the Holograms
• "Who wants to walk on a wire / Dance in the fire / Never get old."
• Bloodstream - Arty Remix, by Ed Sheeran
• "I got sinnin' on my mind."
• Go Go Go, by Sleeping with Sirens
• "I was naïve / But no one knew / I kept it to myself."
• King Kunta, by Kendrick Lamar
• "From a peasant to a prince to a motherf***ing king."
• Can't Handle This, by Bo Burnham
• "Part of me loves you / Part of me hates you / Part of me needs you / Part of me fears you"
• Blank Space, cover by I Prevail

Honorary Mention: Trees, by twenty one pilots. What it lacks in lyrics it makes up for in instrumentation. And it was the most amazing song live.

And for some reason I've been craving an old, old song:

• Sere Nere, by Tiziano Ferro
• "Puoi rimanere / Perché fa male, male / Male da morire / Senza te."

---

I hope to keep this tradition going. I like it.

---

2016!

It Will Be Fun, They Said

I have two types of chill playlists on Spotify: Ataraxia (Tranquility) and Good Vibes. While I've noticed that I tend to listen to Ataraxia the most, I've gotten back in the groove of my Good Vibes songs, which tend to include more rap. I've thus chosen one of my favorite songs from the latter playlist to be the backdrop of this post.

Sunset, by Kid Ink (I love his little hiccups at the beginning of each song)(explicit):

Or if rap (chill or nah) isn't your thing, another song from the same playlist then.

Are You With Me, by Lost Frequencies:

---

I find that I very rarely, if ever, set aside time to reflect on myself. I am unconcerned with character development, I just happen to notice it in myself as it passes by.

I'm a little less lax when it comes to my future. I tend to worry about that a little more, mostly because I have no career path set before me yet. I can go in any direction with an ecology major, but there are too many directions - I've no idea which branch I even want to set foot on, let alone think about all the twigs that sprout off even further along.

In trying to figure out what I want to do, I've been looking at a lot of internship opportunities. Last summer, I saw a real job for me in the wildlife rehabilitation area, but unless I get a position high up in that department, in a likewise large facility, I don't think I will be happy. Not entirely because I seek leadership, but I want to be specialized - I want to go to grad school, hopefully for a Ph.D, but for that I may need to study veterinary medicine - a field even more difficult than a doctor or nurse. I don't think I have the discipline for that.

I'm scouring the internet for opportunities next summer already - which SUCKS, because no dates have been released yet this early in the year. I found a program that will let me research abroad in many different areas of the world, as close as Big Sur, as far as South Africa, and as exotic as Fiji. This sounds entirely amazing to me, especially because I can get an entire semester's worth of credits doing that. I was also sent an email from my school about another different, shorter program, which will let me knock out my required upper-division lab class, also abroad. But since that occurs in May and I will (hopefully) still be in Sweden at that time, I'm not considering it. If all else fails, an associate at my wildlife internship last year let me know of an opportunity interning at the San Francisco Zoo. I hope I don't come across as cocky if I assert getting into that program will be easy for me with a letter of recommendation from another wildlife facility.

This is all short-term though. What of after college? A reality, for me, that seems to be approaching a lot more quickly than for my other classmates of the high school class of 2014.

Because I didn't even question I should take as many AP classes as I could in high school, I am on course to graduating an entire year early - given a course I need to take goes through the study abroad team and I can take it in Sweden. Even at a minimum, I'd graduate a semester early (I was two credits short of starting college a sophomore). It's crazy to think that next academic year might be my last year. I started, and just as quickly I stopped.

I'm not really into this whole college experience. Everyone I know is either having a blast, or had a blast and is telling me college will be some of the best times of my life. I mean, I made a few friends, but none I can see myself holding onto - one is too uninteresting (she agrees with everything I say) and the other very reserved (but she texts her old friends all day). A few others I don't even talk to except in class. I don't see any reason to stay here except to postpone my entrance into the real world. I've made no outstanding memories, I agree the campus and surrounding area is absolutely stunning, but I have no personal tie to it. If I graduated right now, I wouldn't even look back. Probably because this was a poor choice to begin with, but I aimed too high with my applications and was basically stuck with this university or an even worse one.

College has become a chore. It is not to be relished, but is merely a stepping stone to the next phase of my life. I'm not happy about what it's become, I wish I had better reasons to want to stay and extend my time here. I was hoping that when the classes got smaller I'd find more people to be friends with, but now I have those classes they are just enjoyable partners for homework. The people here just don't fit with me it seems, and the fact that they come in as large groups from local high schools already with friends doesn't help.

I tried clubs at first. I became a part of my school's Quidditch team, but it was so awkward. It took months for people to recognize my name, and it felt like we met just to practice. We always talked of getting together for a movie marathon or something outside of practice, but if they ever did I wasn't invited. It didn't help that I wasn't very good at the sport itself either; I always felt I was in the way of some of my more athletically superior teammates. Some people were already friends from past years, and very quickly new recruits in the first months trickled out. I only stayed on the entire year because I was too shy to leave. The only friend I made there is studying abroad this semester in England, and since I didn't really want to rejoin the team anyways I emailed the team head and told him since I was so "busy" and since I was planning to study abroad next semester I "didn't have time" to attend practices anymore.

I don't regret leaving the club, but I am very bored all the time. I don't see any other clubs I'd be interested in, and neither do I want to try joining any again. I never even enjoyed the clubs I was in in high school, though I was a part of three. Those experiences are hauntingly similar to my foray into college clubs.

But I'm scared to leave college. I know how hard the job hunt is, and I'm afraid no one will hire someone as young as me. I want to hold onto the institution of the young, I want the comfort of someone there to constantly guide me along whenever I ask. I don't look forward to leaving, but I'm not enjoying my stay to the fullest. I don't want to become complacent in a job, but neither am I making great strides here. I've boxed myself in; I've nowhere to go.

I constantly wonder if I should've considered transferring universities more seriously. A girl in my dorm, my second friend of only three at the time, transferred to Purdue at the beginning of second semester of our first year. She realized this place wasn't a fit for her, and she got out early. I wish I could've been that brave.

I will graduate early no matter what, given the chance. I'm not going to stay here and waste money that can be saved for grad school. Paying outrageous sums just for the experience and none of the education is stupid, especially since, so far, the experience sucks. I'll just have to chin up and start looking more carefully into job careers from now on.

Pitting Religion Against Religion

I'm not in a very happy mood today, so I chose a not very happy song.

When You Break, by Bear's Den (explicit)

For all it's melancholia, it's a gorgeous song. Bear's Den may become my next band obsession.

---

By far, at this point in the semester, my favorite class has to be Paganism to Christianity.

For the first three weeks we covered Greek mythology, one of my stronger suits in the world of mythology and religion. I've learned a lot of things that the Percy Jackson series didn't cover, like the Dodona oracle, the exegetai, Eleusinian Mysteries - basically, the nitty-gritty stuff that HoO didn't need to cover in order to make sense. Not to mention I read the entire Theogony and Works and Days by Hesiod, which covered five pages, top to bottom in tiny print, of notes about who fathered who and who offended who, plus little tidbits like the actual names of the three Fates/Moirai (Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos), the fact that Athena also goes by Tritogenia (Third-Born), and Aphrodite comes from Cyprus, hence her alternate name Cytherea.

Another interesting thing I kind of always assumed but never really outright learned was the complete and utter lack of secularism. Religion was the law, and kings or governments made decisions based on the gods' will - good omens and the like. In fact, Plato was the first to outright suggest that matters of belief could be criminal offenses. But then again, Plato wanted to ban jokes, so what does he know?

Perhaps my favorite thing I've learned so far is a quote by Xenophanes, and the TL;DR version goes, "If horses could paint, their gods would be horses."A.k.a., anthropomorphism is stupid. Quite interesting how skepticism on religion in Greece was tolerated unless it messed with the practice of rites*. Don't believe in the gods the same way as everyone else? Cool, unless you don't carry out the proper rites. You don't need to believe to practice.

*With the famous exception of Socrates, but to be fair, he was not only disbelieving of the gods, but also taught his pupils the same, and introduced foreign deities. Polytheism doesn't mean it's more liberal in tolerance than Christianity.

This week we started on Roman religion. Up until now, I had assumed that Romans took Greek mythology and just changed a few names around, but it actually worked out a little more like convergent evolution - the Romans already had their gods - Jupiter, Juno, Minerva*, etc. (Ceres was the first to become more Grecian, followed closely by the adoption of Asclepius - not surprising, health and fertility were pretty important things). It's more like the Romans noticed the similarities between the two sets of deities and adopted the cults of Greece into their religion. It was Greece's antiquity - that which the Romans very, VERY much admired - that garnered so much interest and respect from Roman citizens.

*In Percy Jackson, it seems as though Minerva was much less powerful than her Greek version, and Bellona took over her job position. As Reyna told Annabeth, Minerva was more the goddess of arts and crafts in Roman society. But I just learned that on Capitoline Hill is a temple dedicated to Jupiter Optimus Maximus, as well as Juno and - surprise - Minerva. Riordan, what's up with that?

I learned the Romans have no equivalent to the Greek Theogony - no myths about the squabbles of the gods, or who did what to which poor human. There were few stories at all, with or without a moral. Instead, they had rites to celebrate Rome's growth, like a certain victorious day here or a birthday of an emperor there (totally looking at you here, Augustus, you self-centered, conceited master leader you). This isn't to say they didn't sacrifice to the gods at all, but to them the gods were more like benevolent patrons of the state - you could say to worship the gods would be the same as worshipping Rome itself (though that statement is false, citizens didn't sacrifice to their city or anything).

Another interesting (in a different way) part of this class is the number of Christians/Catholics taking it (I also know of one Jewish girl). Not that the interesting part is that they're taking a class that talks about paganism (described by my teacher as "everything other than Christianity"), but how astute and quick they are to draw similarities between their religion and that of the Greeks and Romans.

For instance, I have heard comparisons made between the production of Gaia from Chaos/the Chasm, and the beginning of the universe in the Genesis. I've heard how the Golden Age of Man is similar to the Garden of Eden, and how Pandora is similar to Eve in that they are the cause of all man's misery (My personal observation, might I add, is how they were set up to fail from the beginning by God/the gods, and yet it is still their fault. Pandora with the tantalizing box and a curious heart created by the gods, and Eve with the tantalizing apple of knowledge and free will given by God). Most recently is the comparison of Romulus and Remus to Cain and Abel - brothers killing each other, yeah, I see it.

I don't know, but for some reason it bothers me how much these people are trying to find their God in everything, even in an era when the concept of their God didn't even exist yet. They're kind of like that friend that somehow always manages to make the conversation about them - "Oh, yesterday I went biking with my family." "Really? That's so cool, I once had a bike my brother gave to me, we went riding together all the time, I have to tell you about this one time where we blah blah blah I've changed the subject to me now, hope you didn't have anything else you wanted to say."

That doesn't bother me so much as what went down today though. A boy (the same who connected the Golden Age with Eden and Romulus with Cain) had a lot to say when we learned the Romans weren't as concerned with ethics.

Some backstory: So basically, the Romans had no dogma, and no moral code. To have the favor of the gods in their society meant one was successful, wealthy, and healthy. As Cicero said, "The supreme law is the well being of the people." They had social customs - they had piety, or respectfulness to the gods and the people around them - but their religion itself did not have a code of ethics.

A lot of religious classmates took extreme issue with this news. The boy previously mentioned asked if the religion didn't provide morals, did the government do it instead? Since technically the gods and government are the same thing. I thought this was a fair question, but it slightly unsettled me because it meant in the boy's mind there absolutely needed to be a guideline for daily life from a higher power. If it didn't come from a god, then it had to come from a god-like source. The possibility a code, in any form, didn't even exist in the first place couldn't seem to occur to him. That thought is scary, that he thinks humans are such weak creatures that we cannot independently and rationally determine for ourselves what is right and wrong, and that we'd screw it up if we ever did.

Another dude asked since the Roman society offered no moral code, did the citizens go elsewhere to seek guidance? This one pissed me off much more than the first question, because it implied citizens could not be moral without someone, probably supernatural, telling then what was right and wrong. In my mind, the boy's tone was condescending - how could these people possibly know what to do unless someone else explicitly told them? They must have gone to a different cult for guidance, they wouldn't've implicitly known to be honorable. This last analysis also pissed me off because it implied conversion - a practice many Christians love to promote despite the obvious discomfort of the recipient - not because they "fear God's wrath" and would rather prefer to "sin," but because it's an unwarranted and unwanted imposition of one point of view over another (Can you tell this experience is personal?).

I've never witnessed so many hands raised to ask questions yet - six in succession, quite a lot in a class where no one really has a hard time understanding the material. This phenomenon ties in with I've witnessed with other religious people, namely Christian and Catholics, who all seem fixated on a God telling them what is right and wrong. I've heard extremists - the ones who won't outright say that they think Christianity has a monopoly on morals - claim that without the Bible and/or the Ten Commandments, many people would genuinely not know what to do, and we'd have many more murderers and criminals in general without religion. An interesting claim, since recent stats have revealed .07% of self-reported prisoners are atheist. (What Percentage of Prisoners are Atheists? It’s a Lot Smaller Than We Ever Imagined)

I'm clearly revealing my own bias now, so I'll stop. An interesting note on myself is how I automatically link sources to facts after writing essays that need multiple in-text citations as compared to high school. It happened in my last post too.

Results and Conclusion (Is this a scientific report format I detect?): I am enjoying my class on religion the most out of my four total classes, probably because I'm such a Greek mythology buff to begin with. However, I'm not appreciating the constant comparison of one religion to another, supposedly and traditionally better one. But since I understand that they cannot help their upbringing any more than I can help mine, I won't condemn a person simply because their one view (on a subject that matters very little to me) differs from mine.

Discouraged Passion

My roommate is amazing.

How amazing?

Some people are just born with the gift of perfect timing.

Her essay reminds me of when I was applying to colleges and selecting my majors for each, and my parents were trying really hard to get me to at least consider a field in the arts. I love art, but I'm a little narrow-minded and self-centered in my pursuits - I only like art when I'm the one doing it. I adore playing the piano and I love to draw and paint - but if I were to attend a symphony or visit a museum, I'd get bored very quickly.

Besides that, I also didn't want to pursue art because there's little to no job stability. It's interesting how much of what we fondly remember of the classical era is art - epic poetry, statues, murals, architecture, and of course paintings - but it's such a poor and uncertain field to follow in the post-modern age. I wish I weren't so shallow as to have money be such an important thing to me, but it is a crucial element to a comfortable and happy life.

But my roommate has reminded me of how much I love to draw. It's fun for me, and a break from my computer, and I won't keep coyly denying that I'm not good at it anymore - I'm no Picasso, but I'm certainly better than a lot of other people.

In my first few weeks at college I finally got back into my Evanescia project and finished Aria - whom I had technically finished last October but just never got around to editing. I no longer have my Wacom tablet with me so I decided to leave the pencil marks rather than smoothing it out like I did with the previous people. Besides, I didn't want to mess up the blonde hair, as it wouldn't've done well with the jet-black shininess look anyways.

I got another person done too and ready for editing, but I'll probably wait a few weeks before I finish that too.

It's nice having motivating people around me again.

End of a Three-Month Era

This is the song I want to play when I hear/read people pull the god-awful "Stay in your lane" card.

Lane Boy, by twenty one pilots

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On July 24th, I took my final exam for my internship. It was relatively easy, seeing as it was open note. My boss wanted us to be able to look up information we need rather than relying on memory - a thought I hugely appreciated for some questions.

The community at this place was amazing. I wish I had been a volunteer with the wildlife instead of with the dogs those three years ago. The area was much smaller, and I actually was able to recognize and talk to the other people who worked there. There was a lot more to do when I got bored, even though I was there nine hours each shift.

I can't really have a single topic for this post; rather, I'm just going to recount some thoughts and fond memories I had during this experience.

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Towards the end, I was on lunch break with a 3rd term intern (I was 2nd term). Early on she had come to me seeking a sort of mentor, because I was called in on an off day to help with staff shortage, and she was in Recovery by herself with no other staff on her first day. Anyways, during the lunch we somehow got to talking about the staff and other people at the workplace and our relations with them. We talked about the friendliness/not-so-friendliness of the various staff members there, and in order to make her feel better I recounted my experiences and first impressions of them to kind of give her some "inside intel."

She then likened me with a different intern - an intern who, in 1st term, acted as my own mentor. I hugely admire her for being so amiable and very clearly liked by everyone. She is hardworking, reason-driven, and pretty knowledgable about wildlife medicine in a program where most people are newcomers to the field. From the beginning I aspired to be like her; I have a (perhaps unhealthy) need to please people - I crave praise and recognition.* I wanted to be as well-liked as her.

So when my friend told me I was like this 1st term intern - as well as I can remember it, she said, "You're like MS, it seems like everyone likes you" - it felt as though my consciousness burst out of my body and went spiraling up into the sky. It was the best thing anyone had said to me all summer.

It was similar to another experience I had, though I'll explain the differences later. About a week before my term ended, my boss pulled me into his office and had me shut the door and everything. He told me he just wanted to say that I had done a superb job that summer, and everyone (staff) not only liked working with me, but looked forward to my shifts because "they knew that everything would go smoothly and quietly when I was around." He told me I was definitely one of the favorite interns. I wonder if he knows, due to my record-low confidence, how much saying that really meant to me.

It's different than the comment from the intern though, because I feel as though praise directly from your peers means a lot more than something said to you through a grapevine. I'm incredibly gratified by both comments - they both say practically the same thing - it's just that one of them felt a lot more intimate.

*Ironic, because I have no idea how to receive praise and recognition. I'm the vending machine trying to accept a wrinkly dollar.

---

Raccoons are demon terrors spawned from the Seventh Circle of Dante's Hell. Baby raccoons, on the other hand, are the cutest goddamn things anyone will ever see with their mortal eyes. Especially when they nurse.

And owls are among the most crazy defensive birds we get - they like to go for the eyes. Hawks, oddly enough, are pretty chill - depending on the species and size (smaller = crazier).

---

Seeing the reasons why animals come in has made me pretty angry at the world population. We see lots of birds come in who were caught by cats, whose owners no doubt think it's perfectly natural and okay for a domesticated species to hunt live food, and therefore let their cat outdoors. I don't want to count the number of birds we had to pull due to subcutaneous emphysema - subcutaneous meaning "under skin" and emphysema meaning "trapped air." Basically, a bird's respiratory system consists of six air sacs which act as bellows, moving oxygen around. If one of them is ruptured, the air is released under the skin and creates a giant bubble I saw most often on the leg.

We also get in a lot of "bird-napped" nestlings, where unsuspecting people picked a bird off the sidewalk thinking it was abandoned (it probably isn't, most birds people bring in are fledgelings that just can't fly well yet. Besides, it is a complete myth that parents won't return to a baby bird with human scent on it). I am much more inclined to be sympathetic to these people, as I'm sure they thought they were doing the right thing. It just creates more work for us, treating an already healthy bird to release.

But most recently, the most common species we've been getting in seasonally uncommon numbers is the common murre:

*Like all seabirds, their beaks are sharp and they're not afraid to use them. I still have a scar on my thumb due to another intern's lack of attention to restraining the head while I held the body (he had a good distraction, it was an interesting injury).*

This time, it's not really any individual's fault, but rather a perverse group effort. Before your imagination takes you somewhere else, I'm talking about climate change.

People can say whatever they want, but it's inarguable that the global average temperature is slowly increasing - by .8 Celsius since 1880, or 1.4 Fahrenheit, with two-thirds of this warming occurring since 1975. (earth observatory.nasa.gov) Warmer waters means species shift locations to find ranges that still support their abiotic tolerances. In this case, fish are swimming to deeper, cooler depths than the young, inexperienced murres can dive to. Because of this, nearly all of the murres we're getting have emaciation as their main ailment. Just before I left, we got in four fledgling murres, one with a fractured wing, and all of them needed to be gavaged, or tube fed formula, because they were too weak to feed themselves. Right now, at a sister facility, they have over 200 murres - a number way above average. I shudder to think how many more don't make it to the facilities in the first place. It's pretty awful. More can be read here.

---

That pretty much wraps up my last few weeks as an intern, and then the following few weeks as a regular volunteer before I left for college. I don't know if I want to pursue wildlife rehabilitation as a job, though it does pop up under the potential jobs on my major's page. My boss even said that if I weren't still going though college, I'd have a "golden ticket" to a job at their newest facility elsewhere in the Bay Area - me and my fellow 2nd term intern.

The work is certainly incredibly rewarding, and some staff members there revealed they didn't even pursue tertiary education very passionately and yet they still ended up in a medical field. I would love to work with animals, always have, but job comfort and income are also important factors to me, and wildlife rehab isn't a very lucrative job. But that's an existential crisis for another day.

Compassion Fatigue

Possibly, I think, the most ironic and yet fitting song title I've linked so far, in regards to topic.

Dead Hearts, by Stars:



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"Compassion fatigue: a.k.a secondary traumatic stress (STS), is a condition characterized by a gradual lessening of compassion over time. It is common among individuals that work directly with trauma victims such as nurses, psychologists, first responders, and health unit coordinators."

---

In my internship's last module, we went over this phenomenon. I don't think we have it as bad as doctors and nurses, though - if an ER patient comes in critical condition, you imagine lots of frenzy, perhaps a gas mask and immediate surgery to fix whatever's wrong. They must immediately begin to try to save the person's life; they put everything they've got into saving lives. To fail after such intense work, well...

Wildlife rehabilitation is different. There are no rushing gurneys, no prepped surgery suites. Boxed animals are brought into the exam room and looked at with little fuss. Broken bones, concussions, even abnormal coldness - all can spell euthanasia for a wild animal. And it makes sense, in a morbid way, because A) We only have so much room. We can't take in an animal with little chance at survival when there are others more securely rehabilitated, B) Even if we save the life, if the wrong body part was harmed or amputated - if a necessary appendage for survival in the wild is taken away - they have no chance of being successfully released, and C) Sometimes, they are already so far gone it would be kinder to pull them. Pulling the plug on a human is a horrible concept, and only done after every available resource is exhausted. With animals, if the condition they come in is bad enough, there aren't any resources to draw from in the first place.

This isn't to say that we don't try at all to save animals. One great, recent story is about a Great Horned Owl that was caught in a barbed wire fence, and quite literally tore a hole in his wing. It took many months, but the tissue healed, live feeding trials were a success, and the owl was released with a scar in his wing but able to fly quite confidently.

On the other hand, we got in a common raven about two months ago, who seemed like a good candidate for release. We fed, housed, and medicated him for over a month, hoping he would get better, but began to notice that he was still too vocal, kept gaping for food, and, while self-feeding a bit, wasn't displaying proper raven behavior. Our vet suspected blindness, so we took him out into an aviary to test him. Her hypothesis was correct - the raven was completely blind. He kept waking in circles, and didn't even attempt to fly. A bird like this would never last outside our facilities, so after a month of treatment, he was pulled.

I wouldn't say I have compassion fatigue. It's true that I don't feel much when we can't save an animal, but that was to begin with. It's with people like my boss that have been doing this for years that should have it. But no one really does. Everyone laughs a lot and jokes around, but I suppose it is in the workplace. It's at home where this would be revealed.

I've noticed one way that staff copes with all this death is to adopt a rather dark sense of humor. They don't poke fun at any animal's bad luck, but they crack some jokes that you feel bad at for laughing. For instance, we make bets based on how bad someone's hematocrit reading will be, or just before a live feeding, give the poor mice's their "Last Supper."

I would like to clarify we never play with the animals; we never mishandle or grope them to, say, see how that joint works or flap their wings, dead or alive. We are always prioritizing their comfort - like it would be so much easier to administer Fatal + in the jugular, but we don't do that because A) It's more painful in such a sensitive area, and B) They can see us there. Much better to cover their head and use a leg, back, or wing vein.

Back to the actual topic.

I want to say I don't have compassion fatigue. I mean, it's true that I don't react as strongly to death as other people, but I never really did in the first place. It was just something I accepted. This animal is not going to recover no matter what we throw at it, I'd tell myself. It's death is inevitable. All we can do it assist it on its way. We have to move on. There are actual animals with an actual chance of surviving that need my attention more than some doomed life.

However harsh it sounds, I've reread and re-edited the previous paragraph multiple times and I feel it best represents how I feel. But I have been thinking, and after my whole experience with this internship, I know myself better than this than to think I actually haven't changed at all. At the beginning, if an animal was pulled, I'd be really quiet for a while, and it would take me a bit to rebound back into happy-go-lucky form. Now though, I'm more or less indifferent to the whole thing. I do the whole "Bad Luck" thing, then go on my way. So, in this regard, I do actually have a mild case of compassion fatigue.

Now that I think about it, compassion fatigue and cynicism are pretty closely related. Maybe I've just gotten more cynical since I graduated high school.

---

I didn't want to end on such a downtrodden note, so I'm going to add a comic I found in the newspapers at work (we use the newspapers as substrate for the condos and reptariums).

---

Also, I've been quite the photographer at work throughout the summer, and I've compiled a lot of photos of interesting wildlife. I think what I will do is go back to my old high school hobby of researching an animal/plant every week, just for the sake of knowing. But now, I have my own photos!

(I'll probably still use some online stock though; hard to get a shot of a flying raptor with a camera phone)

The Saving of Insignificant Lives

This post is too somber for actual music. I chose a gorgeous soundscape instead, one of my favorites.

Fortune Soul, by Blackmill

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Four weeks ago, I euthanized a male mallard duck.

Or at least, I was an assistant in his death; I was the one who held him down so he didn't make the process any harder than it had to be.

I was told it was completely painless, that the central nervous system was the first to shut down so he wouldn't be aware of his heart stopping, that to live with a calcified wing joint would be much worse than death.

I took his death well, I believe. It wasn't even like I was trying to hide emotion in the face of a (then) stranger. I genuinely felt no pity for the poor duck. I accepted his fate, that if he were to be released he would die anyways. In fact, I almost think I caught myself faking a little sadness for the staff member's sake; I didn't want to appear a complete robot.

But a week later, a fellow intern and I assisted in the euthanization of a crow with a severe concussion. We could literally see him drifting in and out of consciousness, and he was unable to sit upright or hold his head up. It was a lost cause, so the staff got the Fatal +* ready. But at the point of injection, I noticed the other intern beginning to cry. The staff noticed too, and comforted her. She recomposed herself after we left intake. We had other animals to care for. She didn't have time to cry.

*Fatal + is the name for the anesthesia we administer. It's very similar to anesthesia used for humans, but we basically overdose the animal so they never recover from unconsciousness. As a person who experienced anesthesia during the extraction of my wisdom teeth, I can assure anyone with concerns that it really is completely painless. I remember lying down on the surgery table, and ten minutes later they told me I could get up. I was never even aware I went under.

Am I really that insensitive? Am I supposed to feel such overwhelming emotion for an animal I have just seen? Am I, in fact, completely heartless? I understand the staff showing no emotion; they have been doing this for years. I have just entered this world and, apparently, with such a cruel mindset as well.

I have since witnessed eight deaths to date in six weeks, out of the roughly 10 deaths daily (not counting those who die on their own in our care). I've seen more raw illness and injury in a little over one month than I have in my entire life.

I am an intern at a very well known animal rehabilitation center, which is most know for taking in stray or abandoned dogs, cats, and exotics to adopt out. But in this particular branch, we have an amazing, brand new wildlife rehab facility, where we mostly get birds - passerines (songbirds), hawks, corvids, and waterfowl - but also mammals, like raccoons, skunks, and the occasional weasel.

There are three areas: Recovery, Nursery, and Courtyard. Recovery is where we intake animals. People either bring them to us, or we get them from other facilities that don't treat wildlife. Mammals, seabirds/waterfowl, and large birds stay here to recover. Other than the actual treatment in the exam room, the stories that come with the animals are the most interesting. We've had a crow come in that was wrestled away from a homeless man (who demanded $480 as compensation for what he spent on it), a squirrel that was fed breast milk by the family that brought it in (apparently they wanted to get it back as a pet when we were done - the mere thought makes me cringe. There was also more breast milk in a dish with the squirrel...), a perfectly healthy raven who was only brought in because he refused to move off a man's motorcycle, and a mockingbird who's papers mislabeled it as an albatross.

Here is a mockingbird:

Here is an albatross:

How did they even make that mistake?

Nursery is where the passerines are kept, and sometimes squirrels if they can't be outside yet. I am not a bird person, but I have learned the different species just by walking around and reading the placard attached to each reptarium. Off the top of my head, I can say the most common birds we get are European starlings, juncos, finches, mockingbirds, robins, hummingbirds, scrub jays, sparrows (of multiple species - house, white crowned, golden crowned), rock pigeons, morning doves, and Brewer's blackbirds (abbreviated as BRBL, so we also call them burbles - so cute).

Courtyard is where we transition animals in Recovery and Nursery to outdoors. There are four aviaries for both passerines and squirrels, all decorated with potted trees and branches and hanging sticks - as close to the real thing as we can get. We also have a small garden where we grow chard and a variety of kales, to feed the pigeons, doves, and waterfowl. Also in courtyard are large raptor aviaries, where there are sometimes hawks, owls, ravens, and crows. There are also small and large enclosures for the mammals. In addition to all this, we have two large pools, labeled Seabird and Waterfowl, as well as two small treatment baths, to test for waterproofing.

Out of all of this, Nursery used to be my favorite. When I just started, I felt very self-concious whenever there wasn't any work to be done. Nursery takes care of that problem, because there is always work to be done. We have four feeding timers - 30 min., 45 min., 1 and 2 hours - and they are constantly going off. There are always birds to feed who can't feed themselves. However, now that I am much more comfortable with the people who work here, I have to say I agree with a lot of the other interns thus far - Recovery is the best. As one woman said (the one who cried), everything else - the courtyard cleaning, the nursery feedings, the baby raccoon terrors - hell, the entire internship - all of it is just a ticket into the exam room. There's nothing I like better than getting a new box without knowing what's in it, taking the animal out, and figuring out what's wrong with it and what to do with it.

Sometimes, of course, there's nothing we can do with it. Sometimes a well-meaning person brings in an animal that is too far gone, or they "saved" it from a predator, and we can't do anything but bring it it's inevitable end. Just this Tuesday, we got in a juvenile red-tailed hawk with trichomoniasis. While it's treatable, the bird had too severe a case, and it was so malnourished there wasn't much hope. After it was euthanized, another intern took some pictures of the case and emailed them to me. Here are a couple:

Notice the black at the back of the throat? Those aren't just shadows. Those are pretty advanced lesions, caused by the parasite. Lesions are usually cream-colored, and can grow big enough to block the esophagus and eventually suffocate the bird. This hawk's esophagus was covered with the stuff, and about half of its tongue, too. Also, the outer, upper part of its beak, which is supposed to be yellowish, was a sick greenish tone.

Here's a spread shot of the hawk, with me holding it:

I didn't do a very good job. The wings are much wider; the joint between the radius/ulna and metacarpals could've been extended a lot more. Interesting how they have the exact same names as our bones? Evolution ftw.

You can't really tell from the picture, but the bird was so emaciated you could feel its keel. That's the "breastbone" of a bird, it's nearly equivalent to our sternum but very wide and very flat. In a healthy bird, you should just barely be able to feel it. In this case, you could actually pinch it. There was no muscle whatsoever.

Keel:

This wasn't some common mallard or crow. This was a hawk, of possibly the best-know species in California. And yet, I felt no more sadness at its death than I did the others. While I am uncomfortable and unnerved by my lack of extreme sympathy, I do much prefer it to crying in front of other people. I can cry by myself, easy. I have much to pity myself with. Being so vulnerable in front of other people, no matter how close I am to them, is another story entirely.

This doesn't mean I don't feel sadness entirely in intake. I'm physically conscious of my body slouching a bit every time I see the Fatal + bottle, but after thinking about it, I realize I just have a habit of accepting things very readily. For instance, if there's some sort of problem that could've been avoided by doing so and so - I don't even think that. The problem happened, and the next thing to do is to immediately alleviate said problem. I don't waste my time dwelling too much on what (unrealistically) could be done. I've transferred this habit to the exam room. The bird is sick. It will not recover, regardless of what we can do. I won't cause myself any more distress by dwelling on its mortality. It is hardly the first, and it will hardly be the last. Instead, I'd rather feel joy when working on an animal that does have a chance to recover.

As Dumbledore says, "Death is not the worst fate that can befall someone."