There's a time for self-reflection....

I've been wanting to think about my academic year as a whole...I haven't had time...I wonder if that will change what I think...well here it goes.

I've been trying to decide if it was a 'good' year or not... The year started out on the right foot with PREPARE and meeting lots of great people...especially one in particular. There were days of frisbee and soccer, studying under the trees on Libe, watching movies in apartments - it was all so much fun. Then I started to care for someone... and one, totally unexpected summer night we found ourselves holding hands and her resting her head on my shoulder. I stayed up all night that night, just amazed that it was really happening, I saw the sunrise... well not really, sort of just saw the sky get brighter. I couldn't believe what had actually happened that night for a whole week, I was living in a dream in the best sense of the phrase. That was my happiest moment of the semester... perhaps of the year. But it was only a moment. We didn't really tell anyone until a week later...and that was the last time I ate with Han. I remember exactly where Han and I ate, the lighting, what we talked about (he wanted to drop a technical writing class and join APO). It was the first time Han and I had eaten that semester together... and the last. After that he found out that we had gotten together... and he hasn't spoken to me since.... I had tried to find out if he had liked her... I didn't want something like that to happen, I was trying so hard to avoid it. Since then I've constantly asked myself is it worth losing a friend for something like that.... I think, I think that as much happiness you get from being with someone you care about, and that even though it's the other person's choice for whom she falls for, it's not worth losing a friend. If the relationship was to last forever... and of course you never know... it would be a harder decision...... but some people don't realize how painful it is to lose a friend - your best friend - after something like that. I look back on my pictures from freshman year. I see Han and I in so many fun photos together. One photo that sticks out in my mind is the one from Holi, where I took a photo of Han and I sitting together on a ledge waiting for everyone else to get done. When I see that photo I'm reminded of the comradery we had... And the photos of us flying - we had such a good time together right before he went back to Malaysia. We had spent spring break together, eating Ramen in his room and playing ping-pong and walking around campus with Roger. We had taped everyone's doors with the A-team (of which Han became (H)An).... I found out recently that Han did tell someone that he liked her.... but that person didn't tell me because Han told her not to... I wish I had known... I could've avoided losing a friend... I'm not angry at anyone, not at the person who didn't tell me, nor at Han who said it didn't matter and not to tell me... I'm just sad that I lost a friend.... It especially hurts because when I was with her I had told myself that I was going to do everything I could to make her happy... sort of in honour of Han in a way, that I didn't want our separation to have happened for nothing. But in the end, that's what happened....