Assignment 24 - Jimmy Chen

This year I honestly wasn’t as involved in school and extracurricular activities as I would have liked, mainly due to the nature of the situation we were put in. I did work on practicing violin, I had made it into the National Orchestra, but that unfortunately was put online and not at Disneyland unfortunately. I also probably didn’t manage my time well enough, I had developed such a knack for wasting time doing aimless things that I can’t be super productive anymore and I need to work past that at some point. But, honestly I don’t think I can get the driven well managed Jimmy Chen that once existed back, but I am trying. I also applied to some summer music programs, I really wanted to go to this international summer festival in Milan Italy which I worked really hard on and managed to get into, but unfortunately due to covid it is still up in the air if I will be able to attend. But because I focused a lot on the Milan camp I kind of neglected my other applications. I surprisingly got waitlisted by Bowdoin international music festival in Maine, where I was expecting a rejection since they churn out a good number of internationally famed soloists with alumni such as Ray Chen and Anne Akkio Meyers who both perform with 10 million dollar plus Stradivarius Violins. I also may have extremely neglected my GSA application where I may or may not have used the same essay as last year because I didn’t have the energy to write a new one and generally neglected the excerpts they required us to play, which I unfortunately ended up getting alternated to. Honestly I feel that if we didn’t go online I would’ve probably done so much better with seeing teachers at school and my lesson teachers in person where they can hear clearly and correct my technique which had started to lack due to a year of quarantine. I can see that some people have thrived during this period, but I was not one of them. This has helped me realize and appreciate that although I liked to complain about the structure of school and the mundaneness of life, I really do need this kind of structure in order to succeed. I hope senior year goes well, I do want to get into a good college (hopefully Early Decisions so I can be done with applications), and hopefully live up to my moms expectations. One thing I really need to do is study for the SAT over the summer. This really weird year has given me a new perspective on school and helps me appreciate the structure even though it seems repetitive. I think it has helped me develop a new perspective on my future. I used to be terrified of working a 9-5 job at an office, wearing boring clothes, doing paperwork all day, and being generally mundane and boring, but now I am not really scared of that anymore. After a whole year of being independent and being my own boss I realize that I kind of hate it. Although most people are terrified of becoming mundane and bland due to an office job I really appreciate it.