Et entendre ton rire s’envoler aussi haut

Que s’envolent les cris des oiseaux

Te raconter enfin qu’il faut aimer la vie

Et l’aimer même si le temps est assassin

Et emporte avec lui les rires des enfants

Et les mistrals gagnants

– Mistral Gagnant — Renaud

The song mentioned above discusses how quickly time goes by in life, and we also mature in the process. It’s a classic song, and I love Coeur de Pirate’s interpretation of the song as well. Going off of this, it’s crazy how 2019 is literally right around the corner. So many new things happened during the year, and the year definitely flew by.

2018 was a moment of a lot of ups and downs, but here’s a general list of highlights:

1. Joining a food microbiology research lab and learned how to engineer yeast.
2. Did a lot of food science.
3. I participated in IFT for College Bowl and also won first place with my friends in IFT’s Food Science in Action video contest.
4. I went to three professional conferences: CABBI Annual Retreat, IFT18, and SIMB
5. I graduated college; which is still kind of crazy, since I honestly didn’t think I would make it.
6. I got to know my food science classmates a lot more – and I’m really happy to be friends with several of them.
7. My grandmother passed away towards the end of the year. It was very bittersweet, since I didn’t even get to tell her about my job – but I hope I’m making her proud.
8. I landed my first full time job in food science, and moved down to Evansville, IN.

Some goals for 2019

1. Be more confident and assertive in myself and what I do
2. Explore the food science career as much as possible, and continue learning
3. Be somewhat more outgoing
4. Be happy and take care of myself

I’ll probably tweak this list along the way, but it’s a start for now!