I’m spending my final semester of college at the Williams-Mystic Coastal & Ocean Studies Program, where I’ll take interdisciplinary courses in science, history, literature, and policy, conduct independent research, and visit a few different coastal regions! I’m going to write about my experience along the way to share it with you all.

Williams-Mystic

I’m finally here at Williams-Mystic! I just moved in this morning and it is already a whirlwind. Here are my thoughts, briefly:

  • Mystic, CT is a small coastal town with lots of cute shops and restaurants, a bunch of boats, and a beautiful sunset over the Mystic River. I live in a historic house on the Mystic Seaport Museum campus. It’s really nice inside! Also, there is free in-unit laundry…
  • My new housemates are nice! Tomorrow we’re going grocery shopping, because we have to cook most of our own meals from now on. That will be new for me.
  • The people here are super interesting. Students are from completely different majors and places, which is a sharp contrast from CMU, where I basically only talked to fellow computer science nerds. At dinner tonight, I talked with my new marine ecology professor, who told us about her crazy diving adventures.
  • After dinner, each person was asked to stand in front of the room to introduce themselves, state a goal for the semester, and describe a powerful learning experience they’ve had. That was honestly the best part of the day (rivaled only by the tiny desserts at dinner), because I got to learn so much about everyone from the stories they told. People were vulnerable and real up there. I was surprised by how comfortable I felt when it was my turn.
  • We’re literally leaving to sail in the Caribbean in two days and it is INSANE. I am both nervous and excited about everything and I’ll let you know how it was when I get back.

Finally, here’s how I introduced myself at dinner:

  • I have an awesome little brother who’s an artist.
  • My goal for the semester is to be more open to new things.
  • My powerful learning experience? When I started paying attention to birds. (That was only six months ago, but it feels like much longer.) I started identifying them using an app (Merlin), and pretty soon I was seeing new birds everywhere. I saw a new one today. All I had to do was look. And then I couldn’t stop watching: baby robins nesting right outside my window, turkey vultures circling overhead, flocks of crows peppering the sky over the city. Taking time to notice things transforms the mundane into the fascinating. This is true not only for wildlife but for pretty much anything. History used to bore me, but with some help from excellent professors, I started to see beyond names and dates to the story of how people once lived. I’m confident that you can make any topic deeply interesting if you know what to look for. And so that’s how birds taught me to go through life with curiosity and wonder.

It was a great first day at Mystic.

back to blog