Thought of the day

Thinking alot about what if I had to do it all over again these days. So many other fields come to mind -- child development (based on Alan Alda's wonderful series on the spark that makes us human), stem cell researcher, science historian. Funny since I never really gravitated towards science but it found me late in life and now I'm sort of addicted to it. Of course the information I have is rather scattered, depending on what research I'm currently writing about.  I follow in the investigator's footsteps, parsing Wikipedia entries and articles until I understand their findings, and then move onto the next finding.

In this haphazard way, I've learned about everything from short term memory loss to aphasia to retinoblastoma to gastric bypass -- like I said, quite the mishmash.

What was it that kept me from seriously pursuing science studies? Partly being a woman and partly fear of math (although I did quite well) and partly insecurity and lack of confidence. Maybe the hard work as well and the need to find something totally different than anyone else, which I think is also a product of the same insecurity -- when you feel worthless, you want to shine somewhere and being a writer -- which is what I wanted and what I got -- seemed more striking and brave, particularly when attending a college where 70 percent of the students were pre-med.

So our paths are forged.