Hills and Valleys: A Final Reflection

There is a song titled “Hills and Valleys” (BYU, 2021). While it is not one of my favorite songs, I have heard it before. The message of the song truly struck me this summer. It is a song of faith, of knowing that no matter whether we on top of the mountain, or living down in the darkest valley, God is with us, and we are not alone. This summer was a valley for me, one of the deepest and darkest I have traveled for a long time. But I know that I am not alone, that my trials and struggles are simply a valley that I must pass through before reaching the sunlit mountaintop again.

This summer was comprised of six college credit hours, a harrowing veterinary emergency, new job responsibilities suddenly laid at my feet, and the loss of a solid income within my household. While most of that list could be described as negative or unpleasant, the summer was also time of growth, both mental and emotional. College, for instance, has taught me far more than what the syllabus suggests. It has taught me fortitude, patience, and given me a deeper understanding of my world and the people who walk beside me every day.

English Composition II, taught by M. Spaly, was a class that taught beyond the confines of university walls. Throughout the class, Professor Spaly reached into our lives and encouraged us to take the knowledge she was giving us and use it like it really meant something. We were given the opportunity to choose our own topics, a relief given the horrors of assigned topics I faced last semester. I chose a topic I knew was applicable in my life, that of the human-animal connection. Remember that veterinary emergency I mentioned earlier? Yes, there were tears and more when I had to sit down and write while going through that. But it was important, necessary even, and it helped me cope and even grow through that time of pain. Thankfully, I have now passed through that valley. Perhaps my writing has improved due to persevering when all I wanted to do was give up and cry in bed all day.

Writing for English this summer brought increasingly greater benefits as time went on. Sitting down to study my chosen topic was almost always a relief from my current reality. I was able to finely hone my research abilities while having fun doing it. Each project brought with it development in new and critical areas of composition. Project #5 was the culmination of the semester’s work, and it was quite enjoyable. Taking professor Spaly's encouragement to heart, I chose to link my subject to my chosen profession as closely as possible, which was not very difficult considering the fact that my subject is the very foundation of my passion. It is important to me to see how each stage of a project works to complete the whole, and project #5 did just that. I enjoyed the creative aspect of compiling everything into a website. I am very proud of the finished product, especially the printable PDFs. The design that went into them was so much fun and yet required critical thinking to tie it into my topic properly.

The main roadblock for me when working on my website was proper MLA formatting. I am a perfectionist when it comes to how something looks, so when my website builder did not allow hanging indents, first line indentation, or block quotes, I was quite irritated. The only way I have found to overcome this problem thus far is to load the document as an image and paste it onto the site, which is not ideal. Since I manage two other websites, I will be looking into this and seeing if I can overcome the builder’s apparent programming. Otherwise, project #5 was fairly smooth. I struggled to come up with the proper number of additional genres, but my classmates were of great benefit to me because they started throwing out ideas without me even having to ask. Class time was a sunlit mountain top for sure!

When I consider this semester and all that transpired, I cannot help but be grateful for what happened. Not everything that happened, mind you, but most of it. I learned a great deal about myself and my capabilities. I also learned some of my limits and how to avoid crossing over them. I know that I am an emotional writer, so much so that academic writing is sometimes a challenge. My theory is that emotions are hard for me to display in-person, so the written word is a release and a form of discovery for me. Something that I need to improve is my overall dedication. I know I gave some of my projects only half the amount of effort I could have given them. Perhaps I could have dived more completely into studying my topic or researching it’s complexities. However, I know that I did well, even though I was all-around exhausted, so I will take that knowledge and improve my habits next semester.

There are so many things about this semester that I can use in my school life and future career. To begin with, this semester taught me how to give a topic my all. From contemplating the overall topic, to preliminary researching, to discovering the story behind it, to fleshing out details with research, each step was important and fascinating. I know now that there is a story behind every topic, and research on nearly any question you can ask. I learned to love the process, that is what I will take with me moving forward. Hills and valleys, ups and downs, slow times, grueling times, and times of fun and excitement - the process of writing really includes them all, does it not?

Works Cited

BYU Vocal Point. “Hills and Valleys.”. Grace, BYU Records, 2021. Spotify, https://open.spotify.com/track/4DZliGXjAEFqKXb2KeQ3gV?si=dfc888b0a1b24a99