Satisfaction

Triumph is sweet. After 8 months of training, stress, mixed bouts of elation and depression, we’ve gone there and back again from the National Science Olympiad. And we have done all we needed to. After all the time and pain and struggle, we have TRIUMPHED!
2nd place in Bio-Process Lab. FINALLY I’ve earned more than a bronze-colored medal. And it’s absolutely beautiful. And that’s not even mentioning the stunning 5th place in Solar System, a sweet reward after the misery-creating 7th place (one off from medaling) in Reach for the Stars last year. No one who saw us could say that it doesn’t pay off, because it really truly does. Although I didn’t do as well as I wanted to in my other events, I reckon it doesn’t matter. I did my best (although I still think we could have gotten gold in Bio-Process. >> That was my fault for starting at the station just after the microscopes…).
And anyway, it was an amazing trip after all. The sheer smell of the Hershey store might have been enough…but then there was the American Girl store with the creepy look-a-like dolls, the staying up late to talk about philosophical/theological topics with one of my best friends, the amusement of the plane ride home (aka sitting behind a lady with the worst case of BO known to mankind and doing all the things we could to circumvent the terrible smell, including concocting a potent smelling potion), staying up late the other night to be entertained by boys…not to mention the 8th grader Hawaiian and my teammate. :P Now that was a picture.

And then there was everything else. There were the screams of stunned joy as we medaled in Solar System and Write It/Do It. There was the frustration of the mousetraps’ failure in Junkyard Challenge. There was the baking heat of Chicago and the pouring rain we returned to. There was the red-bricked campus and the skyscrapers of the city. Did I mention the Cheesecake Factory (best ever!) and my birthday? Or the Museum of Science and Industry and the Fairy Castle? Absolutely stunning.

Mentioning that fairy castle, I wanted to give a few words on it. Let me just say this--it is one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. In the entire museum, after coming out from that room everything else looked bland. That is something that’s truly enchanting. The carefully crafted structures, the beauty, the stories it ties to, and the way things are thought out are poignant and touching. If you get a chance, look it up sometime. It’s amazing.

Anyway, moving on. I’m glad, in the end, after all of this that this happened. Even though sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it, I always know in the end that it is. Maybe it’s like that in life too. Perhaps there’ll be a resolution after the long dark years in the night. We can hope. We can dream. And we can trust. <333333333 to my partners and my teammates--GO FALCONS!