Social and Academic Lives

"Regrets, I've had a few, but then again, too few to mention." As the voice of Frank Sinatra echoes, my dad and I sit at the corner of an American buffet, I look at my food; then to my dad and ask him, "Do you have any regrets?" I thought for sure he would say no. He's a very accomplished man, getting into TsingHua University, the equivalent of being accepted into MIT. He still remembers how to do algebra, geometry, calculus even yet he has never touched a problem in that area for almost 30 years.

"I wish I was less of a 宅男 (zhái nán)."

"What's that?"

"It's a boy who spends a lot of time at home. I spent most of my day at home or at school studying whenever necessary. I sort of wished I could have played more."

To me, this was a huge shock. My Asian dad, someone who has never directly encouraged me to pursue playtime, tells me that he regrets not being more social.

"You know, you asked me before if I could go back and change something about myself, what I would change. I can tell you right now that I would want to make myself more social." My dad said looked off into the distance, eyes pensive.

I could only muster up a dull reply of "Oh."

Back in the hotel, after showering and brushing, I laid in my bed, the lights off, and I realized something, that everyone has regrets. I know it sounds obvious, but sometimes I forget that everyone has something about themselves they usually don't like. Even if the people are more productive, more successful, more outgoing, more anything, and even all around happier than I am, there is no one who is perfect. When you spend a lot of time doing one thing, you lose a part of life you can never get back. My dad wanted to play more basketball, but he turned to studying and because of his age and bad shoulder, he can no longer play.

So I want to tell all those people who spend their days with friends that when you look back, you'll have memories to live on, but also maybe you'll have regrets of not working or studying harder. To those people who work hard, study, and focus on academics, you'll hopefully get into a great college if you're not in one already, probably get a good job, but even after that, you might not be regret-free, you might wish you had more friends in high school, hung out more and fooled around more. However, just make sure to not regret it too much, because then you won't actually see what you had, memories or accomplishments.

As the night closes in, I float away to dreamland, the last words of My Way playing in my head,

"Yes it was my way." Indeed, my way...