By: Anya Chen

While I scroll through my classmates’ social media posts of them traveling and at the beach, I can’t help but be jealous of the wonderful summer they have. I was two minutes into a five minute break, on my way to cram more math into my remaining brain cells.

When other people have their summer breaks that actually give them a break, I’m stuck at home with a long list of things to do: math, writing, dance, singing, piano… the list goes on and on.

Especially because it’s the summer right before I start high school, I have a million tasks to do that will help me through my high school career. My mom, being the college counseling expert she is, decided to enroll me in a variety of summer programs to ensure that I use up all of the resources at hand.

My everyday summer schedule usually goes something like this; I wake up at around 9 AM, munch on some porridge made by my grandmother, and start my long to-do list.

I start off with my “skip math by taking it over the summer” course, where I finish a chapter almost every single day. The curriculum recommended a schedule, where you do 4 lessons a week. But because of the time constraint, I’m over here doing four lessons per day, frying my brain cells at 10 AM in the morning.

My brain probably tastes like KFC by the time I log onto the Letterly site. I have this writing camp to do, and it is really enjoyable! Every day I have second drafts to write, as well as today’s writing. Honestly, this is fun, almost like a reward after finishing math. The topics are always so interesting and exciting, and never too long.

In the coming week, my afternoons are now filled with a graceful element of pain: ballet. I have ballet every weekday from 1 PM to 6 PM, 5 whole hours. I always come out of these dance classes extremely sore and sweaty. But even though I’ve been dancing for 10 years, I’m seeing improvement every day.

For the aspect of music, I’m also constantly trying to improve in my singing classes, especially because I have competitions throughout the school year.

My summers, unlike others, are filled with academic and artistic growth. It is almost like a 3 month trial before the school year, preparing me for the stress that is about to come. As I watch the show “The Summer I Turned Pretty” in my free time, I experience it all with a twist—“The Summer I Turned Studious”.

Image Credit by Oliver Dohrn