Amani, ‘12

Happy New Year, Prospectives!

I hope your holiday season was wonderful and restful.  Now, of course, it’s back to business. 

I know that you’ve all been working hard on those college and scholarship applications, so keep up the good work.  At times the whole process can become a bit overwhelming, but trust me:  it’s all worth it in the end. 

While I know you all have been back in school for a little while, this week was our first week back, so I’m still trying to get back into the groove of things.  Unlike fall semester, this semester we did not have much time between moving back in and starting classes—in fact, dorms opened on Sunday and classes started Monday.  I kind-of missed having that orientation period, but it’s okay—everything is going pretty smoothly so far.

I am very excited about the classes I have this semester.  I’m taking CORE (yes, it lasts the entire year), Spanish through Literature, Drawing, and The Black Vernacular.  CORE is not so exciting, but it does seem like we will be reading more interesting books this semester, including one by James Baldwin and a collection of poetry and prose.  We’ll see how that goes.  I’m taking Spanish Lit because I wanted to continue my Spanish studies so that I might eventually become fluent in the language.  (I plan to minor in it.)  Also, my Spanish professor from last semester is teaching it, and I liked her class, so that’s a plus.  I was fortunate enough on Monday night to discover one opening in the Drawing class, so I registered for it and dropped the Music Scenes course I had.  We did our first drawings yesterday with charcoal, and I really liked it.  I’ve always wanted to do something artistic like drawing or painting or playing an instrument, so I’m glad that I can finally pursue this interest.  Besides it being messy, charcoal drawing is really cool.  I think I might have a new hobby.

And as for The Black Vernacular…let’s just say that it will be an interesting semester with this class.  Before registering, I asked around concerning the professor and received mixed feedback—lots of people told me not to take his class because while he was a great person, he was a ridiculously demanding professor.  However, there were a number of people who highly encouraged me to take his class because he was an amazing professor; he just demands your best work.  Apparently I went with the latter recommendations, and I don’t regret my decision.  I do think the course will be challenging, especially after hearing Dr. Ashe’s twenty minute statement on the first day of class about how we might not be cut out for his class.  Like I said, it will be an interesting semester.  But I decided that I will determine my own destiny in that class, so I have set off with my best foot forward and hope to keep it that way.

In other news, my roommate and I got our lofts removed.  We decided that we would be more comfortable in our room and be able to accomplish more if our beds were just on the ground, lol.  It took a little while to figure out how we could effectively rearrange our room, but after a couple of hours we had succeeded in our efforts.  I like it a lot better this way.  :-)  

I also got my wisdom teeth removed last week, so I’ve been walking around with pain killers and rather uncomfortable holes in my mouth.  But don’t worry—I’m okay. 

I’m so excited about next week!  Although we don’t have Monday or Tuesday off like some universities do, afternoon classes on Monday are pushed back and abbreviated to allow attendance at our annual MLK Day celebration, and I don’t have class on Tuesday because my professor will be at the inauguration.  We are living through some real serious history, Prospectives!  Our nation has come so far!  Don’t take this occasion for granted!

I will probably have pictures from the celebration in my next post, so look out for those.  I think I’m going to go draw .  Until then, keep working hard and continue to keep a positive attitude.

Amani


Mandatory pics of siblings (taken on my visit home for my followup wisdom teeth appt.)

My little brother playing with feather dusters, lol