This summer, like many of you, I participated in a research program here at Penn State. Originally I wanted to spend my summer between Dallas and Houston shadowing vets and maybe participating in a research project at a local university. However, when my PI contacted me and asked me if I wanted to come back to State College I agreed because I wanted to get a headstart on my thesis.
While I do not necessarily regret my decision to come back to State College for the summer, I will say that this was one of the most frustrating summers I have had in years. The majority of my frustration came from issues that were going on at home and then the additional stress of things not working in the lab had me constantly on edge. The majority of the summer I was just looking forward to everything being over because it seemed like everyday things just got progressively worse.
Still, with that being said, I am glad that I persevered because I learned a lot this summer and I feel like I got a lot accomplished. Even though I spent three months working on things that yielded virtually no publishable results, I learned a lot about what not to do and new techniques to try when things are not working. I was also glad that things did not work over the summer because I was able to avoid wasting a whole semester during the school year.
In conclusion, this summer I learned a lot about how to make the best out of a bad situation. While it was a frustrating summer, I learned a lot about life as well as myself.
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