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It's nearing the end of my second semester in college. For about the past month and a half, I haven't exactly been the best student ever. I've stopped doing work for two of my three classes (I was originally taking four, but I dropped one after the add class period passed; it was insane hard), and I just generally don't feel like doing the work.

One of the classes, Theories of Personality, is a hot mess. I dislike the professor—which I knew going into the course—and her teaching methods, and I don't generally find the subject matter interesting. The other class, Bilingualism, isn't in the same state, but is similar. While I absolutely love the professor, who is my advisor, the subject matter and teaching methods are not to my liking. It consists of doing some readings, discussing them in class, and having an occasional assignment. I find myself dreading the readings, and to top it off, I'm the only freshman in the class (which has a total of 15 students). This seems like a childish worry, I know. The thing is, however, that all the other students have taken other linguistics courses (thus far, I've only taken Intro to Ling), know what they're talking about... I feel completely lost in the class most of the time; it's like I can't see something that everyone else can plain as day. It's intimidating and makes me want to bury my face in my jacket.

I talked to my advisor today about this, and to get clearance for registering for classes online. She said that it didn't sound like a lack of motivation to do the work, but something more general, possibly depression; I can't really argue with that. She asked me if I want to go to/graduate from college, and I told her that I had been wondering about that recently. She then gave me a homework assignment: For the next week, she wants me to really think about whether I truly want to be in college right now. It's funny how easy it is to forget that I have that option, not going to college. I don't think my parents would mind not paying the insane tuition anyway. Haha.

So, that brings this story up to the present. I guess the first thing I should address is the question "What do I want?" Hm. What I want is to be happy with who I am, preferably not changing myself to meet others' expectations. The exception to this would be if I think the change is reasonable and wouldn't largely change who I am. "Change who I am"... That sounds like I'm not open to growth; this is not true. I think most will understand what my intention was, yes. What else do I want? I'd like someone to accept me fully and completely for all that I am, including my vices. Someone I can talk to about anything and not feel awkward sharing my thoughts with. I think a valid answer would include what I don't want. I don't want kids; I can't bear the responsibility of unknowingly ******** up another human's life. I don't want people around me who assume the worst of my actions or my words (excluding times when I'm clearly intending the worst). I want people who don't freak out about the littlest things, and are able to tell me truthfully when I am doing so.

This leads me to the next question; "What do I want to do?" Put simply, I want to do what I want to do. Profound, right? Well, the thing is, I'm not entirely sure what I want to do, only that whatever it is, I want the freedom to be able to do it. As of right now, things that interest me most are linguistics, psychology, and the Japanese language. The first two are pretty broad, so I'll try to narrow these down. In regards to linguistics, I think language is amazing. I seem to have a knack for picking them up—my Spanish teacher in 9th grade asked my parents if I'd ever taken Spanish before because I was doing so well in the class. For whatever reason, learning how to say things like "I'd like you to take this book and send it to my grandmother for her birthday" or "******** off!" in another language just tickles my fancy so much. But getting back to linguistics, the study of language (and not of a language)... I dunno. I've had a hard time pinpointing what exactly interests me. Maybe I'm more interested in sociolinguistics; I'm not entirely sure. Random linguistics-related tidbits: I love the Chinese r sound, expletives, implosive consonants, and one of my all-time biggest wishes is to be able to speak every language in the world. As regards psychology, the human mind is incredibly fascinating, how it learns, adapts. I think I'm more interested in therapy; I always seem to attract people who have something going on in their lives that is causing them anxiety, pain, depression, etc. I've been told I'm approachable, and a good listener; good qualities for a therapist to have. But I can't ignore my interest in linguistics completely. Who knows? Maybe I'll go into speech therapy, or rehabilitation for recovering aphasics.

While these things interest me, and certainly make me happy in some form, I still feel that college is not right for me right now. Other things that interest me include: playing video games/MMOs for hours on end; randomly stopping to watch a squirrel, or a bird, or a lizard, or to look at a plant that catches my eye; I have a fluctuating interest in photography, usually of nature; making people laugh; questioning social norms; challenging my self in little ways.

I have yet to actually have a job. For some reason, this makes me feel... not incomplete, but something like that. I have this idea that I should have already had a job, or should have a part-time job. I don't understand the concept of currency.

With all of this, we are left with the question "Do I want to go to college right now?" This is the one question I can't answer. Some things about college make me love it; some other things make me hate it. This is the question I am going to try to answer in the next week. Wish me luck.