Friday Perspective

Another great day to donate! Two marathons and two charities! Let's raise a combined $6,500 for cancer research through Fred's Team and low-income seniors with Housing Opportunities and Maintenance for the Elderly (H.O.M.E.)!

Donate to H.O.M.E. here. Donate to Fred's Team here. More information here and at the top of the blog!

It's Friday! We have lab meetings each Friday. It is my turn. I presented two months ago. And I have nothing new to show. My student accomplished a bunch, but I will let her present in two weeks. And while I repeated a few experiments to add to my numbers, that isn't really anything worth telling.

About every time I've set about getting ready to present I feel as if I haven't done anything. But then I go about getting my work together and soon enough I realize I have a lot. And I need to think about what exactly to present and what will need to be left out. This time it didn't happen. So I am going to present ideas. Ideas for experiments. But only ideas. I wonder if the boss will notice.

That last bit is a joke. Of course she will notice.

This is not lab meeting. But I will still look just as zoned out.

J. gave me a few more pictures from the Survivorship celebration. I suppose you could tell. I had to look him up, but I'm sure you all remember Scott Hamilton. I found a video of him doing a backflip on ice-skates, his signature move. And it was pretty cool. Still, it felt like Sloan Kettering was digging rather deep to find a celebrity. He won gold in the olympics. But it was the year I was born. Still, I mentioned his name to someone at work and was overheard by another coworker who went ecstatic. So perhaps I just wasn't the target audience.

Very humorous, exceptional speaker, and all around short guy.

But Scott wasn't there because of his celebrity (heyday or not). He was there for his attitude surrounding his cancer diagnosis. Cancer didn't stop Scott. He embraced the challenge and kept moving, kept living, and his attitude is inspiring and infectious. He has been raising money for cancer research for years. He has been spending his time encouraging and supporting. I hope I can grow up a bit more to be like him. Just taller.

That evening of "celebration" got me thinking. I can tend towards the pessimistic side. I haven't completely shaken my childhood nickname of Eeyore, "If it is a good day, which I doubt." I find myself unconsciously looking for the worst to happen, seeing the hard things, or the annoying things, like noticing how much of my work doesn't work, and how little I've accomplished in the last two months, and even the last few years. I don't know how to focus on the good things without feeling like I'm pretending everything is cheery. I don't know how to keep everything in perspective.

But it is not for lack of good examples. At the celebration there was a wall to pin notes of happiness and excitement and celebration. And standing there I thought of someone I knew and loved who had cancer and yet kept things in perspective. I remembered his infectious enjoyment. I remembered his desire to support and encourage. I remembered his grill and cigars and his "I was saving this for a big win, but today will have to do" attitude. And I wanted to live into that even if just a little bit. So I left my note.