Penelope

Our family dog died last week and I just wanted to pay homage to her on my blog because we miss her so much already and everyone is really sad.

She was one of those dogs who always looked perky and inquisitive, because of the way her large years always stood straight up and because of her shining personality. she looked a little like a small german shephard, but she was a mutt, she was all blonde with a black face. She was nothing like anyone else in my family because she seemed permanently happy, eternally faithful and always gave a fine warm hello.

in every picture taken of her there is a blur where her tail is, because it was always wagging. every morning she presented my brother with a sock as a suggestion to play. She never really jumped inappropriately, but you knew she was extatic to see you. She had the bounding energy of a child, up until about a month ago.

if we could all be a little more like Penny the world would be a much better place.

Lab Lessons

Doing experiments in a genetics laboratory really has the ability to teach not only lessons about science, but also lessons about life. I am completly convinced of it. Now, maybe this is just because I choose to see it this way, and maybe I am forcing this, but these ideas speak loudly to me.

Each experiment we do is aimed at providing information about the existing biological state of something. But each little experiment is also a micro scale view of the much larger lessons in trial, error, error and error, in tenacity, in not taking it personally, in thinking critically, in failure and in luke warm achievements.

Right now in our lab we are doing a project that is completely new to all who are involved, even the head scientist. We are getting results, but we dont really know how to interpret them. So, each time we do our experiment we get the result .04, for example, which is a low number. Some people say this is a reflection of some biological condition that we are measuring, while others say that the experiment is messed up somehow.

In the beginning of this project we envisioned it working super well once all the correct factors were in place. We envisioned getting a 100 and not a .04, followed by some kind of dorky but satisfying high-five and maybe a celebratory drink when it all made sense. Now, after doing it time and time and time again, and learning bit by ever-loving bit how to do it correctly, I realized today that there is just not ever going to be a high-five moment. There is not going to be a time when it all makes sense. Things progress too gradually and never really get all that much better. And I hate to take a life lesson from this, but I am afraid I have to, ouch.

3 Statements

A few statements that have come to mind lately:

{Fear is stupid}

{Nothing is homogenous, mostly everything has some underlying variation}

{Now that school is out for the summer, I am reminded that I dont know how to relax and have a day well spent}

Two Trains

Picture it: Two trains travelling at the same speed, in the same direction, towards the same target.

The target is {Knowing Something Really Well Station}.

As train 1 progresses on its journey to the station, passengers board and bring little bits of information with them. They have a lovely ride and stay on the train the entire way to the final station.

As train 2 progresses it gets more and more tired of its journey, again and again, the same thing. It contemplates stalling or jumping the tracks, anything to get off its narrow limited path through the countryside. As this train approaches its target station-it is completely run down and sick of the journey and the countryside and all of its passengers.

The two trains pull into the station at exactly the same time.

I realized the other day that these two trains, are actually the same train.

Here is New York

This is an excerpt from E.B. Whites book, {Here is New York}, 1948: I am going to get this book and read it.

There are roughly three New Yorks. There is, first, the New York of the man or woman who was born there, who takes the city for granted and accepts its size, its turbulence as natural and inevitable. Second, there is the New York of the commuter--the city that is devoured by locusts each day and spat out each night. Third, there is New York of the person who was born somewhere else and came to New York in quest of something. Of these trembling cities the greatest is the last--the city of final destination, the city that is a goal. It is this third city that accounts for New York’s high strung disposition, its poetical deportment, its dedication to the arts, and its incomparable achievements. Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness, natives give it solidity and continuity, but the settlers give it passion. And whether it is a farmer arriving from a small town in Mississippi to escape the indignity of being observed by her neighbors, or a boy arriving from the Corn Belt with a manuscript in his suitcase and a pain in his heart, it makes no difference: each embraces New York with the intense excitement of first love, each absorbs New York with the fresh yes of an adventurer, each generates heat and light to dwarf the Consolidated Edison Company. . . .

Demons

When you are so crippled by anxiety and you let it overwhelm you to the point that you completely ditch out on the lecture you have to give- tears mixing with beads of sweat- then you realize that your problem needs to be addressed. You feel sorry for yourself and people treat you with the kid gloves of pity. You are ill and a loser.

But when you are crippled by anxiety and you dont let it own you and you walk through the door and you do give your lecture. No one cares that you are battling a demon, they just judge you on your lecture: that your voice was not loud enough, or that you overstated or understated something.

Not sure what I want, but it just occurred to me the other day that once you actually do something people never assume that it was the hardest thing that you have ever done. They just know that you did it and now you join the ranks of all the others who have done it and you are judged against them.

Maybe this is my secret reason of wanting to just opt out of things, then I wont be able to be judged against others and they will never know how good (or bad) I could have been.

All The Places I am Not

and before I resume writing my paper for school, because I am sitting at home and have been all day struggling, because I am restless and bored, because I cant concentrate or appreciate the cup of tea beside me, the absolute quiet in my apartment right now, the view of the newly painted manhattan mini storage sign or the sun sort of coming through the window in my kitchen.

Because no one can truly appreciate where they are, I wanted to write an homage to all the places I am not:

Not in an office, all stuffy and gray, struggling to tell a client why they cant have their way.

Not on the street, roaming and sad, with nothing to do but get into something bad.

Not about to give a lecture to a room full of people, all nervous and sick, watching the clock for each ugly tick.

Not in a factory, all stripped of my individuality.

Not in a hospital starting at the ceiling, wondering why I have this terrible feeling.

Not too cold or too warm, or too bold or too forlorn.

Just sitting here, sipping my tea, not in need or absurd or a black eyed me.

Sip, type, sip, type, type, sip.