| Friday, January 23, 2009 |
| My Courses |
I'm taking 15 units this semester and am at school Monday-Friday for much of the day. It's overwhelming and challenging, but I love it! Chemistry is my hardest class and my favorite is microbiology. Seriously, I love micro. I'm also really interested in biochemistry and how chemistry relates to pharmacology. We won't get into those areas much in my chemistry class, but it is a foundational class that will help me understand more specific areas within the field. Here are the course descriptions:
Chemistry: A course for science and engineering majors which covers the nature of atoms, molecules, and ions; chemical reactions; stoichiometry; properties of solids, liquids, gases, and solutions; electronic structure; periodicity; chemical bonding; and an introduction to thermodynamics, equilibrium, and precipitation oxidation-reduction, and acid/base chemistry.
Microbiology: This course is an introduction to microorganisms, including bacteria, viruses, protozoans, fungi, and helminths. Topics covered include the general properties, characteristics, and classification of microbes, identification and control, genetics and biotechnology, physiology, metabolism, and ecology. Also discussed are immunity and the medical impact of microbial diseases.
Human Development (also called Developmental Psychology): This course involves a study of development and behavior throughout the human life span. Classic and up-to-date research on the physical, cognitive, and psychosocial domains will be presented. Theories will be integrated with practical application concepts throughout the course, underscoring the importance of life-long learning and adaptation.
Science Colloquium: Highly recommended for all science majors. This guest-lecture series will feature a broad range of professional scientists invited to summarize research and current issues from their disciplines. Topics will emphasize the bridge between the science (astronomy, biology, chemistry, environmental science, geology, physics and medicine) and society. A schedule of topics and invited speakers will be posted at the beginning of the semester..
I'm also doing swimming twice a week to get some exercise in. And... I start working on Monday. So, if I die of exhaustion, you'll understand why. ;) |
posted by Carsen @ 10:43 AM  |
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| Friday, January 16, 2009 |
| Home |
I have called many places home, even places I’ve never lived. Things or people feel like home just as much, if not more, than places. I feel more at home in my parents’ new house, a place I’ve never lived, than the one I call my own. I feel at home with Elmise in my arms, whether it would be in Haiti or Michigan. I am at home in the wild, whether I be surrounded by mountains or oceans or meadows. I am home when I’m surrounded by my siblings. I am at home when I’m praying and worshipping, whether it be in the quiet solitude of my bedroom or the crowded stadium of some revival tour. I feel at home in many places, but no matter where I go or who I’m with, I miss someone or something. It’s not that I can’t enjoy the situation; it’s just that there is a sometimes quiet, sometimes thunderous, longing in my heart for something more. I usually put a label on that something so that I can attempt to identify it, “I miss Haiti… I miss my mom…. I miss the mountains…” whatever it may be. I’ve said that I just need to be content with wherever I’m at, mostly because I’m aware of what other people may think, but never really believing it.
I don’t want to be content. I have dreams and longings and hopes for adventures and great accomplishments and things better than this life as we know it that I’m too stubborn to let go. So I live with this stirring of the heart not knowing what to do with it. To stifle it would be to let go of the very desires that make me who I am and to let them free would be dangerous and vulnerable. John Eldredge makes a case for the discontentment I feel in his book, The Journey of Desire. He writes, “Something awful has happened, something terrible. Something worse, even, than the fall of man. For in that greatest of all tragedies, we merely lost Paradise- and with it, everything that made life worth living. What has happened since is unthinkable: we’ve gotten used to it… Regardless of our religious or philosophical beliefs, most of us live as though this life is pretty much the way things are supposed to be” (bold mine). If becoming used to the everyday life is something awful, then I must have something right. As if to answer my question about this longing, this discontentment, Nathanial Hawthorne writes, “Our Creator would have never made such lovely days, and given us such deep hearts to enjoy them, above and beyond all thought, unless we were meant to be immortal.” You see, our real home is not here. We get little glimpses of heaven in sunsets, poetry, laughter, music, and love. These hints of a life lived full give us enough desire to keep us longing for more, unless of course we dismiss them and become used to the world we live in.
I’ve recently wondered where I should say I’m from…. Woodland? Redding? Michigan? Haiti? San Diego? What if we became so heaven oriented that our response was, “I’m from Paradise.”? We were not meant for a life full of sin and violence and heartbreak, only for a place more beautiful and grand than we can imagine. “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.” Philippians 3: 20-21 (Also see Isaiah 65). |
| posted by Carsen @ 10:28 AM |
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| "As for me, I am in your hands; do with me whatever you think is good and right." Jeremiah 26:14 |
| About Me |
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Name: Carsen
Home: California, United States
About Me: army wife, nurse, daughter, sister, Jesus-lover, and friend.
See my complete profile
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