David Farmer ENGL 1102 Midterm Dear Aaron, This semester I have been taking the second English

course of my college career (ENGL 1102), and it has caused me to rethink and overthink every aspect of my life. One of the first things I remember doing in class was taking a few random objects and asking questions about them. Never in my life have I been given the task of overanalyzing a yoga mat. Regardless of my confusion as to what the purpose of this exercise was, I switched my brain to super inquiry mode. I asked questions about everything from the size and thickness of the yoga mat all the way to why it existed in the first place. I even went into multiple layers of overthinking, contemplating what events in my life led to thinking about a pink yoga mat until I could think no more. After having this mind-blowing experience, I was ready to learn more. Over the next couple of weeks, I distinctly remember having many class discussions about our central theme, What Does it Mean to be Healthy? All of a sudden, I realized that I never thought about my own health at all or what I could do to improve it. I usually eat as much as possible in the dining halls, I only exercise twice a week at the most, and there are times where I disregard sleep in order to get more things accomplished. What would happen if I actively tried to improve these things? Would it have a major positive impact on my life, or would I function as well as I always have? Is it even possible to be healthy as an engineering student on a meal plan? I have asked myself all of these questions and then some, but I have yet to find the answers. Perhaps I should attempt to eat a balanced diet and avoid making a greasy hamburger-pizza-taco-cake sandwich every time I get hungry. Maybe I should take

advantage of the size of the campus and start running, as I regularly did several years ago. It may even be possible that the amount of energy I gain from getting more sleep will allow me to get the same amount of work accomplished every day in less time. My brain has been in a constant state of inquiry ever since these discussions about health began. Shortly after our discussions about health, we were given our first major assignment. I had to write a paper describing what it truly meant to be me. This is where things started to get crazy. I have always been torn by my desire to become an engineer and my passion for music. I realized over time that the only way I could be satisfied is if I did both. How could I possibly express this inner conflict in an essay? I shut off all forms of modern technology (not counting the lights, of course) and began to write. At the time, I was extremely sleep-deprived and what I wrote wasnt even making sense to me. I started off the essay by explaining how my brain was in a constant civil war. I sounded more like someone who belonged in an insane asylum than a sleep-deprived engineering student, but I kept writing anyway. As the essay progressed, I wrote about how both sides of my brain had completely different ways of thinking. I wrote that the logical side of my brain is responsible for my commitment to engineering, but it also causes me to be overly-ambitious. I managed to express that overly-ambitious mindset in one sentence; If Im not doing everything, Im doing nothing. I have been thinking deeply about just that one statement ever since I wrote it nearly a month ago. What does it truly mean to do everything? Is it possible to do everything while remaining healthy? Is it worth it to do everything? I want to know the answers to those questions even if I never find them. If I wasnt constrained by time and energy, I could have written an entire page on just that statement alone.

Describing the creative side of my brain was much more difficult. The creative side of my brain defies all logic and causes me to go into stages of what I referred to as creative overload. How does one write about something that defies all logic? I still have yet to find the answer to that question, but I attempted to do it anyway. I described the process that typically leads into creative overload in the best way I possibly could. I find myself listening to music, and Im inspired to pick up an instrument (usually the French horn or the piano) and play it. However, I have to draw pictures as well. Nothing can stop me, not even myself. A couple of hours later, Im drawing a prototype for an electric French horn attached to a trumpet (this actually happened after writing the essay). Once I am satisfied with the insanity I have unleashed, I share my random drawings with the world. I am left with a sense of perfection that is impossible to describe. How does one describe perfection? After expressing the depths of my thought process, I had to find a way for my essay to make sense. I decided that the best way to do it was to describe how both sides of my brain interact throughout the week. I particularly emphasized what happens on days where I have a clear divide between engineering and music classes. Looking back at what I wrote about Tuesdays when that divide is most evident, I tend to disregard my own health to do everything. I rely on a healthy mixture of Gatorade and coffee and a power nap to get through my nearly constant 12 hours of classes. However, I get to be an engineer, a mathematician, a singer, and a French horn hero all in one day. I get to be an unstoppable force. How has this class been useful so far? For the first time, I have entered the depths of my brain to ask questions that have never previously surfaced. While I have not been able to answer all of my questions in life, the ones I have been able to answer have influenced me to

become a more curious person. By questioning everything, I have learned about myself and the world around me. Inquiry is where learning begins.