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In Class Learning's Connected to my Personal Life

In class, we often debated nuanced questions with no true answer, like “Does stealing from a thief make you a better person, or are you both bad?” and “Is lying ever warranted?” Those debates never ended in a clear yes or no. We’d talk it through, and the answer always landed somewhere around “it depends on the situation.” That way of thinking has shown up in my own life through religion. I was baptized Catholic and did all the communion and confirmation steps, but in college I found myself in a more Christian crowd, so I now sit somewhere in between. My faith is a big part of how I guide myself and my morals, but I don’t practice it blindly. My boyfriend has been trying to grow stronger in his faith, and we recently had a conflict over it. He was reading the Bible in a very black-and-white way. At first it was little things, but eventually I couldn’t bite my tongue anymore. I told him that nothing is as black and white as it seems. The Bible says disobeying your parents is a sin, but ...
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Something I Learned About My Relationship

Last weekend, I went to a concert with my boyfriend and his childhood best friends, who were in town visiting. I’d never met them, and I really wanted to, since they’re a big part of who he is. I knew going in that it wouldn’t be my kind of night. I didn’t know the artist, and I’d be the only girl with five guys, only one of whom I actually knew. But my boyfriend asked me to come, and I knew he’d do the same for me in a heartbeat. That’s what a relationship is, I think: showing up for each other, even when it’s a little out of your comfort zone. The show ran from 12 AM to 2:30 AM, which is right in the middle of my sleep schedule, because I’m the girl who’s in bed early. It was EDM house music, so no lyrics and no story, just bass. I grew up in Texas on old country, where every song actually tells you something, so this was a whole different world. And somehow I still had a great time. Most of the night, I wasn’t even watching the stage. I was watching my boyfriend, laughing with his ...
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What I Learned From Helping Launch Neeley AI

 I joined the Neeley AI executive board thinking I'd mostly learn about AI, but I ended up learning a lot more about leading people. Our goal was simple: build a place where students could get into AI without feeling intimidated by it. Getting to our launch event was messy, though, because we didn't have enough decorations, a speaker we tried to book never worked out, and faculty canceled the humanoid robots we were counting on. We were stressed, but we didn't stop, we just kept going. Then I got to host the event, and walking out to see 300 students in the room is something I'll never forget. I was nervous, but I really wanted to do a good job, and once I started talking it got a lot easier. What I took from all of it is that things rarely go the way you plan, and you just have to keep moving anyway. I'm excited to see Neeley AI keep growing, and I hope we all learn a lot along the way.
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Man, Beast, and the Fear In Between

I think the werewolf got so scary in the 1500s because people were already scared and looking for answers. The stories had been around forever, from Lycaon turning into a wolf to the Viking sagas, so folks were ready to believe them. Then when awful things happened, like Pierre Burgot, Michel Verdun, and Giles Garnier killing children in France, it was easier to say "werewolf" than to accept that a regular person did it. Whether those men were mentally ill, hallucinating, or just killers, everyone believed the werewolf story, and the confessions only made it worse. It also gave people someone to blame. A lot of the accused were beggars, hermits, or outsiders, and they confessed after being tortured. Peter Stumpp might have been a victim of politics more than anything. The numbers got blown up too. One historian traced the "thousands" claim back to a prosecutor who counted a whole region, and the real total was probably a few hundred. Reading about this made me thi...
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What I learned about road trips from this past weekend:

 I went to Carlton Landing this past weekend, and it taught me a lot about how to make a road trip actually fun. I used to think a good trip meant having every stop planned out, but the best moments were the ones we didn't plan, like pulling over just because something looked interesting. Snacks made a huge difference, because nobody stays in a good mood when they're hungry. Downloading our music and maps before we left was a smart move too, since the service can get spotty once you're out of town. We made a habit of stopping to stretch every so often, and it made the drive feel a lot shorter than it was. I also learned that I have to sit in the front seat, because otherwise I get carsick and the whole ride is miserable. Once I was up front with a good playlist and a snack in my hand, I could actually enjoy watching the road go by. Now I know a road trip isn't just about getting somewhere, it's about making the drive part of the fun.
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Millerite Thoughts

I went into this thinking the Millerites were just some people who got a date wrong, and honestly that's how I'd heard them described my whole life. William Miller turned out to be a farmer and War of 1812 veteran who spent about two years poring over the book of Daniel before he ever told anyone what he'd found. He figured Jesus would return sometime around 1843 or 1844, and somehow that idea took off through newspapers, lectures, and huge camp meetings. When the first date came and went, a preacher named Samuel Snow pointed to October 22, 1844 instead, and that's when things got intense. Some people sold their farms or left their crops unharvested because they figured they wouldn't need them. Then the day just... passed, and the heartbreak was so bad it got its own name, the Great Disappointment. What got me is that it didn't end there, since groups splintered off and kept going, including the one that became the Seventh-day Adventist Church. After comparing t...
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9/8/2026

A main theme of what I learned last week: time flies when you're having fun. I already knew this cliché, but this week I really lived it. I went to Fredericksburg, TX, for one of my freshman roommate's 21st birthdays, and we spent most of the trip in disbelief. We met three years ago, and now we're wrapping up college later this year. We reminisced, and even the most mundane memories felt valuable in hindsight. We also drove four hours there and four hours back, talking the entire way. That might annoy some people, but I loved every minute of it. The four hours flew by, passing through small Texas towns, staring out the window, talking about nothing and everything. It completely filled my cup. Coming back to school after that trip felt like a slap in the face. I still feel mentally stuck in summer, senioritis is creeping in, but the first couple weeks of work are already behind me and it's time to lock in. Crazy how fast that shift happened. So the lesson isn't ju...
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