I decided to head off to MIT- it's now official because I waltzed into the computer room this morning (actually this afternoon, since I woke up at 2 PM) and told my parents "It's official, I'm going to MIT." Really, I don't think there was any other choice for me. I was fairly certain once I got accepted that there was nowhere else I'd rather go, and that it was the only school I could pick without regrets. Columbia Admitted Student weekend convinced me, and the 36 or so hours I spent in New York City were mostly spent asking myself if I would really pass up MIT for a pretty campus and convenient restaurants.

I still haven't managed to press the reply button on my.mit. The decision's already made of course, and I'm heading there to spend $200,000 of my parents' hard-earned money in hope of a decent education and a happy future. I am not headed anywhere else. I didn't fly to CA to check out caltech, didn't make the 6 hour drive to Cornell, never even saw UChicago. I have a week to press that button, and I've officially walled myself in. No other decision possible at this point, but even though I'm sure it's the right one, it still feels like four years of unhappy work and my entire future is based off that tiny click of the computer mouse. (Gosh, I love computers. Everything important becomes such an insignificant process. Click click click click click tap tap hi you just destroyed a relationship with an old childhood friend by sending a nasty email. Byebye friend.) Anyway, I guess I'm mostly scared that I now have to sort out what I really enjoy doing, and what I was just doing for college admissions, and that makes me a little sad as well.

I really hope I find the people I belong with at MIT, and I stop feeling like the odd one out. It hurts every time one of my friends in particular snickers and says she would never apply there because it's a place for NERDS and LOSERS. It hurts, even though I really have no reason to value her reasoning over mine, and I know it's not true that going to MIT makes you a "loser". I do know, though, that I am one of those people that are normally considered wierd- its like I'm living in my very small, very isolated country out in the middle of a very large ocean. Not many connections to be made, and the ones I do make outside my family are never strong enough to hurt when they eventually disappear. This world was not set up for fascinated (yes I do mean fascinated and not fascinating) introverts. I think it would be a better place it it was though. Anyway, dear MIT, please help me see some meaning in this sometimes-pointless world. I know that's a tall order, yes? But please send me on my way, and let me meet someone who still thinks the world is shiny and full of HOPE and let me naive and believe it, or let me be inspired like I used to be and push me out of this dark room.