Taking the SAT, Achievement Tests (now the SAT II's), and applying for college was not a very organized process for me.  My parents were totally oblivious to my lack of socialization, but the fact that I always got straight A's assured them that everything was okay.  My parents didn't think it was necessary for me to take any prep course for the standardized tests since I was supposed such a smart kid.  So I took the tests with very little preparation.

My choices for applying to college were based solely by their names and reputations.  I had absolutely no idea who I was, where I was going, and what I wanted to do with my life.  I don't know why but I ended up applying to Harvard, MIT, CalTech, Yale, Columbia, Stanford, UC Berkeley, UCLA, and USC.  I was waitlisted by the first 3, rejected by the next 3, and accepted by the last 3.  So I basically chose to go the best of the 3 colleges I had the option of attending.  I suppose my lack of a strong identity, personality, or voice during my interviews hurt my chances of attending the very best private colleges, but I had all of the numbers to get into those schools.  Some people felt bad for me and thought it might have been some form of reverse discrimination, but I have no one to blame but myself.

Coming to Berkeley, I truly felt that it was going to be a fresh start for me.  I won't reiterate my path to choosing a career path seeing as it's detailed in my first story.  Like most freshmen, I was very ignorant when I first arrived.  I tried to get through my required classes too quickly instead of taking some time for myself and explore all that Berkeley has to offer academically and socially.  One stupid thing that I did was take Chem 3A (o-chem), Bio 1B, Physics 8A, and Math 1B at the same time during my 2nd semester here at Cal.  This schedule epitomizes my narrow-mindedness since I never took any time to explore all that Berkeley has to offer nor did I explore my personal interests.

Even though I didn't really know what I was doing during my early years at Cal, I consider myself very, very lucky for having great friends.  It was the very first time in my life that I had become associated with a group of people that I could consider friends.  The core group of friends comes from my freshmen year, but I've met a few new friends in the subsequent years.  I think my friends are the greatest!  For any of you who may have actually read up to this point, I just wanted to let you guys know how much I appreciate your friendship and support over the years.  I just love all of you to death.  I don't know what I would have done if you guys weren't there for me to pick me up when I was down, made me feel better when I embarassed myself or made a complete ass of myself (I'm sure you know what I'm talking about), and helped guide me becuase you guys probably me better than I knew myself... but you probably didn't know why I was such an insecure person.

I'm sorry I didn't share more with you guys, because it might have answered a lot of the questions y'all had about me.  I realize it must have been frustrating for you guys to see me struggle with myself, but you guys knew that the only way that I'd ever learn is to make mistakes, big and small, and hopefully I'd be intelligent enough to learn from them.  I'll always remember that you guys drove down from Berkeley to Monterey in the middle of a foggy night to make sure I was okay after my car accident.  I don't know if anyone of you can imagine what it's like to be afraid of going to sleep, but you made me feel comfortable and secure and allowed me to rest after everything that had happened.  The fact that I'm comfortable sharing my stories now shows how much I've grown and matured from that naive and insecure person you met over  four and a half years ago.  Thank you for everything and I wanted to say again how much I love all of ya.

12/24/98