i did nothing these past two years, part 1 by Boheng C. '28

this morning, i got kicked out of my lab.

of course, it felt like a surprise when i heard for the first time. it was a surprise. had it not been just weeks before when i trod headfirst into that office, illuminated by the hot summertime glow of killian court, a bit suffocating in its boisterous proclamations of lemonade encased in sweat and retreat to air-conditioned dorms, and had i not declared bright-eyed to my postdoc supervisor that i wanted to continue this research for another semester? and had he not said yes, yes of course? and in that moment, had i not felt that i was meant to be there? that i belonged? that i, after all, was truly there?

or had those few weeks grown monstrously into months already, and had that hot summertime glow been instead the soft vernal midday sun, and had the buds of spring barely emerged from their snowy blanket?

what have i been doing all these months?

what have i been doing for two years?

the research was fun. i loved it even, i loved continuum mechanics and calculus of variations and i loved making all the plots and doing fourier transforms. i loved being able to work on the research wherever i wanted. i loved watching terms cancel out and variables dance around the page. in short, it was everything that i could’ve asked for in a urop⁠01 undergraduate research opportunity . of course, it was a bit abstract, and sometimes difficult to see how the assumptions translated into physicality, but i felt like i was doing something.

and yet, i can only ask why i spent so little time on the research. certainly, i was busy and i had less time than i wished that was left over for the urop. but time and time again, when faced with the choice to do something i dearly enjoyed, i said no.

and so, this morning, when i declared bright-eyed to my pi⁠02 principal investigator  that i wanted to continue this research for another semester: “i think not.”