A 9-Step Guide To Surviving Your Summer Internship Alone
By Cynthia Liang
This summer, I interned at AMD, a microchip processor company, as a software engineer on their graphics driver team. I was able to work firsthand with my team members to make the driver render proposed Windows graphics features, internally track and display system stats, and remain compatible with current updates. It was an extremely worthwhile experience, and I’m glad I got the opportunity to do some really cool things on the job — if you ever use AMD’s graphics driver with Windows, my code will be there, doing some behind-the-scenes work!
I’d love to talk more about what I did with regards to corporate work — if anyone’s interested, feel free to reach out — but this post will not be about my 9 to 5. Trust me, there are many more qualified people than me to talk about graphics drivers or C++ or 3D rendering APIs. Instead, I’d like to share some insights I gathered in non-work-related areas this summer. For some context, I lived alone for a while in a relatively quiet suburban area in Massachusetts, with no access to a car (I carpooled to work) and no ability to easily access city life (Boston was a fair distance away — certainly not a reasonable trip for a weeknight).
Therefore, I’ve compiled a list of 9 things I’ve gathered from my experiences this summer. I hope you enjoy looking at summer break from a slightly different perceptive.
1. There’s something deeply satisfying about eating home-cooked meals. I mostly cooked for dinner and brought homemade meals for lunch, partially out of necessity (I didn’t have a car, and delivery options were scarce), and partially out of preference. Though I’m not an amazing chef by any means, it was fun learning how to create and consume different dishes (and a great way to bond with coworkers)!
2. Mom was right about 8 hours of sleep a day. I, like many Stanford students, have a questionable sleep schedule (can you call it sleep if you don’t really partake?) during the school year, but for some reason, I would crash during work if I slept less than 7.5 hours a day during the summer. As a result, I ended up sleeping from 12 AM-8 AM every day without fail during the week. The results? Magical. My skin was clear. My head was clear. Birds heralded my successful sleep schedule. (It didn’t last long after school started; old habits die hard. Even so, I’ve tried to snooze as much as I can, when I can afford it.)
3. You have less time and mental energy than you think to do your own side projects. Experiences probably vary for this, but at least for me, I was often tuckered out after coming home from work. An 8-hour-plus grind is no small task for your mind. Be ready to be way less productive mentally outside of work than you think you’ll be.
4. Call your friends. Call your loved ones. Call everybody out there. It’s summer. You’re alone. Your friends are scattered all around the globe. I found that the one action that brings normalcy into the everyday rise-and-grind is keeping in touch with the people you care about. Whether it be a quick text or hours-long video chats (or even in-person meetups), I felt my communities’ presence, even though I was away from home and Stanford.
5. It’s the little things — and the out-of-the-way things — that bring you joy. For example, getting soaked during a jog in the rain but being able to see a rainbow afterwards. Or trekking out to watch the Fourth of July fireworks and seeing the expanse of sky and stars afterwards. Or wandering pop-up farmer’s markets (did you know that Boston has a fermentation festival every summer?) on a ten-dollar transit rail weekend pass. I had some lovely experiences just watching the sun set over the tiny lake by my homestay, taking in the sky as it slowly shifted from a wide expanse of blue to a slow and heavy midsummer purple. The world is a gorgeous, fascinating place. It’s nice to take a break from routine once in a while and get lost in its embrace.
6. Don’t lock yourself out of the house. I speak from experience.
7. Your coworkers are really cool people. I ended up getting to know some of my coworkers very well this summer. One of them is a softie for Sheryl Crow’s old country music. Another is a skateboarder and motorcycle aficionado. A third is extremely fond of peppercorns, loves a good Moscow Mule, and dreams of living near a windmill. All of them are driven, wax passionate about computer science and graphics, treat interns with compassion, and love a good chocolate bribe on the first day. Whether it’s through team outings, grabbing lunches and dinners, or simply a good chat during breaks, getting to know the people I worked with was one of the best parts of my summer.
8. If your food sets off the fire alarm, you’re probably doing it wrong. This one is pretty self-explanatory.
9. Have time to reflect. I didn’t keep a strict journal or jump on a reflective social media spree this summer — it works for some people, but it’s not the way I do things. However, I did have lots of time to think. Summers away from school, and away from anyone, gave me the breathing space I didn’t know I thirsted for. Biking or walking through nearby hiking trails and, with no set destination or timeframe in mind, I thought a lot about how better to navigate my communities’ spaces, what I envisioned for the future, and why I was feeling the way I felt. And it helped me come to terms with a lot of things, one of which was loneliness.
Whether it be wandering around all the art museums in the city — a hub for couples and families — by myself, listening to coworkers talk about their kids, or simply living in an area with a high population of nuclear households, I was consistently reminded that I was alone. But through my experiences this summer, I found that that being alone does not have to be the same as being lonely.
Fulfillment comes from many places, whether it be the friends I stayed in contact with, the time I was able to take for myself, or simply a good home-cooked meal. And honestly? That’s how I was able to survive my internship — great people, self-care, and a whole lot of slightly charred lunches. 🙂
