Hard Work Becomes Rewarding

Attending the Artwalk yesterday and today completely filled me with inspiration and hope for making great work here at MICA. All of the seniors did such fantastic work and I thought they all deserved great recognition. Seeing all of the amazing talent around these fellow students make me feel grateful for attending this school and it is a great reward to have seen the potential in everyone here. It was even more exciting for me to go around and find postcards or business cards because it's like taking a piece of their work home with me to admire and appreciate. I enjoy collecting so many postcards and business cards from a lot of art shows, craft shows, and from other students that I find interesting, as a source of inspiration. Now I have taken my collection and organized all of the work on my wall in my room so I can always see them instead of hiding inside a drawer collecting dust or something. It's like have a mini gallery inside of my room with people's artwork hanging on the wall. Seeing all of the vast amount of work has gotten me to finally starting to open up and appreciate several mediums of art even more everyday.

More motivation and creative drive to just make art has recently revved up inside of me again, because I felt like my passion for drawing dwindled since foundation year. I mean, I did have motivation throughout this year but it seemed more like a forced sort of drive, where I had to get work done because I was required to, not because I wanted to personally express myself as freely. I also had stupid drama with relationships that seemed like high-school bullshit this year, making it harder to stay as focused as I wanted to. (It's a long story.) So now, it's time for me to get a move on and just let it all go before I start to lose whatever is left of my self esteem. I can't let all my insecurities eat me up into a state of continual pessimism. Keeping myself super busy with various assignments and excessive side-projects this year were just my way of trying to forget about all the negativity which were significant at the time but are completely trivial now that I look back on everything.

I can't let my worries get the best of me anymore, and I need to work on finding solid ground. Reflecting back on the course of the year, there are accomplishments that I am humbly grateful to have made, yet there are times where I wish I could have stepped aside to take better care of my actions. Sometimes I wonder if I should have "done this" or "did that." Sometimes I wish I did not miss certain opportunities that came by, or I wish I went out to hang out with so-and-so instead of hiding insecurely in the apartment to work even more on a project, or dwell in my own introspect. I feel like I've gone completely obsessive impulsive or something, but in the end I am still very content at least. However, I do look forward for next semester. I need to try and loosen up a little more instead of setting my expectations too high so that I do not set myself up for false hopes or feel overworked. Sometimes I do feel remorseful at times for not giving myself more of a break from time to time so that I could go out and have fun with friends or something. Or taking time to be more involved around school more, and being more outgoing with others better. Most of all, I could have made more connections with those around me and learned to appreciate all of the people that I attend school with. I just want to let everyone know how much I am grateful for being their friend, even if I do not get to talk or see them as much as I wish. I feel like I don't seem to say that enough to anyone or show how much I really care.

Anyway, enough of this emotional, introspective tangent. Another subject which is more positive, is that I have received an offer from Baltimore City Public Schools to work full-time with them this summer! Which was quite a surprise! I already had two internship offers previously since the internship fair from Strategic Results and MOS Creative. Both seemed like fairly interesting companies to work with, and it seemed like I would be working with some really nice people! MOS Creative was a marketing and advertising agency that offered experience working with clients that need brand/identity such as interactive work for the web, animations, print, and logo designs. This was a credit-based internship. The other internship at Strategic Results was at John's Hopkins University, where they would work with various government agencies, medical research/technological institutions, etc., where they also needed help with branding/identity, and web work. They were a paid internship for $10/hour. Since I would not have time to work for two places at once, I was thinking of going with MOS because of the wide range of experience they offered, even though they were only credit-based. I figured I would work at Phillip's again part-time to get income or something. So I waited for them to contact me again because they already wanted to hire me soon, but I wasn't sure how soon I was going to start. Plus, contracts needed to be turned in to the Career Development at MICA soon before I would start. I tried contacting them again several times, calling their office, leaving a message to the receptionist for them to get back to me soon, and sending multiple emails.

After a few days, I was getting a bit hasty because I had to meet the Internship Coordinator at MICA with confirmation about the position, but I had no final confirmation from them or signatures soon enough. Meanwhile, during the time I was trying to urgently contact them, I was astonished to receive an offer from Baltimore City Public Schools who needed a web content manager/graphic designer to incorporate unique branding/marketing for all of the schools in Baltimore. Reading the contract for the job, I was surprised yet in slight disbelief that they would pay $20/hour, 40 hours a week. It is amazing that they found my resume through the MICA network, which I thought would not be of such service because I was in doubt that anyone would find me standing out enough. Plus, I never thought I would ever be qualified enough yet since I am only a sophomore- actually, a soon-to-be junior now! Immediately, I set up for an interview today and met with the guy in charge who was really impressed at my resume and thought it stood out the most amongst all of the ones he saw online. He told me about how I would be helping them make the dozens of new logos and websites for all the schools and thought it would probably be just a breeze since I had a lot of extra experience. Then he instantaneously hired me for the position! YAY! I leaped for joy, and thought that this was definitely an offer I could not pass up. I worked so hard trying to impress companies for an internship, but now instead I am surprisingly taking a real full-time job instead this summer! It couldn't get any better!

And yet, to top off my day with additional sprinkles of joy, I checked my grades for this semester. I got an A+ in Graphic Design II, A in Interactive Media II - Web Design, A in Typography II, A in Love in the Western World, and a B+ in Psychohistory & Autobiography! YAY! I am so grateful right now to finally feel accomplished and relieved that this semester is done.