The Last Day of February 2026, Spring Is Finally Here

Today I revived my long-dormant blog. Back in 2024 I used to jot down casual essays and course notes, but as things got busier and the PhD application grind wore me down, the habit faded away, along with my evening runs.

In 2026 I've decided to pick them both back up. After four brutal months of cold and a winter storm that swept the entire East Coast, DC finally greeted spring on the last day of February. Yesterday I walked through Georgetown and across the bridge again, and slowly I found myself recalling those nights years ago on Luojia Mountain, running under a dark sky, feeling the cool breeze, wondering where life would take me.

Since 2024 there has been plenty of bad news and plenty of good. I received a few offers, chose the one that felt right, spent three months at Westlake, and then rushed off to DC. At the time I thought my application strategy was a bit of a failure. I didn't listen to my family's advice to apply for an MS as a stepping stone. Fortunately my advisor turned out to be incredibly kind and supportive; I figured I'd just publish papers and work toward a degree.

Half a year has passed in the blink of an eye. Some of the work left over from undergrad has started to bear fruit, and sometimes I can't help wondering: if I were doing an MS right now, a year's worth of accumulated results might have carried me to a better platform. But as Frost wrote, two roads diverged in a wood. Once you pick one, you'd better walk it with both feet on the ground. With that mindset, I keep pressing on.