What Did I Do This Summer?

In which I try to explain that gap in my résumé.

August 25, 2019


Among other things, I went to Montana and my little brother and I pretended to be lynels.

I’ve been told that, when a potential employer sees a gap in a person’s résumé, they tend to want to know what was going on during that time. I was hoping that I would be able to say that I spent this summer writing fiction and blog posts, but anyone looking through this site (or my GitHub) may have noticed a large absence of activity in June and July. So what exactly was I spending my time on all summer?



Classes

Does anyone know how to decrease the difficulty in this game?

I took three classes online through Purdue this summer. Each class was a semester’s worth of content crammed into either eight weeks or four weeks, so the workload was fairly intense, even with only three of them – hence the lack of writing in June and July. Specifically, I took:




Books

The greatest argument against e-books is that you can't stack them up on your desk like this to look all smart.

Every summer, I tell myself I’m going to read more, and every summer, it doesn’t happen. But this time it did! I read more books in the last three months than I had read in at least three years before that. I don’t want this post to just turn into me rambling on and on about the books I read, but in case you’ve been looking for something to read, I can give a brief two-sentence summary of what each book is and what I thought of it.




Video Games

Seriously, just look at how gorgeous this game is! (Source: Hollow Knight Steam page)

There seems to be a general idea out there that playing video games as a hobby is somehow juvenile or shameful. You might hear people sneer at someone who “just sat around a played video games all weekend,” but you’ll rarely hear the same disdain for to someone who spends their free time reading books. I reject that. To me, video games are a form of art, a unique way to entertain, invoke emotions, and prompt reflection just like books or movies. Sure, there are a lot of games that are just trying to give you a fun time and that’s it – but there are plenty of kitschy romance novels or cliché fantasy stories doing the exact same thing. So, yeah, I did play through different games this summer, and yeah, I am proud of that.




Other Stuff

I think this one is titled "The Execution".

I did a variety of other things that didn’t feel like they warranted their own section, but still felt worth mentioning as important parts of my summer.




So, if you’re wondering why there’s a big ol’ gap in my résumé from May to August 2019, that’s why. Long story short, I was just sort of doing my own thing and enjoying life for a few months before I graduate and get a full-time job and never get summers off again. And looking back now, I have to say, that was absolutely a good call.