Rejection is a brutal thing to experience. Nobody wants to be rejected, especially if they just showed you the best version of who they are and why they deserve your love.
I work in academic research. I get rejected all the time. The high frequency of rejections forces you learn how to numb the pain, limit the amount of time you spend at your own pity party, and pick up the pieces to start over again.
One type of rejection that scientists like me often experience is the road to getting money for research, which boils down to a few things: We put our intelligence and ideas out on the line, and get about a 97% chance
of having them rejected. The process looks something like this. I come up with an incredibly interesting and important scientific question about a natural biological phenomenon (something like: how does an embryonic stem cell know how to become something else, like a neuron, or a kidney cell, or a red blood cell?), I come up with a great idea to experimentally answer said question. In fact, I come up with several great ideas so that the experimental designs reinforce one another, and to have an alternative way of getting to that answer just in case one of the designs doesn't work out. I write a long scientific proposal to explain why answering this question is critical for mankind, important for the betterment of general biological understanding, AND will for sure cure cancer one day. I tell them all about my many grand ideas and why the methods that I came up with are the only hope the field will have to answer said question. Concurrently, I must ensure them that my experimental ideas are well thought out and will DEFINITELY work! If not, I've got all these other alternatives --list several other great ideas. I spend weeks preparing this document. Illustrating the problem and the experimental ideas through my own words, past research done by other people, and pretty pictures. In addition, I write them another document --another sales pitch but this time for myself as a scientist explaining why I am an awesome researcher and why I deserve their love. Look at all these skills I have! Look how many research papers I have published in 5 years! Look at my education! Look at all these techniques I know! Can't you see that I am an exceptional researcher and deserve this money you wanna give to fund research?
I write all of this without sounding as desperate as I feel, of course. And then, 2-4 months go by. I hear nothing. Then an email. Sorry, not so sorry. Out of the hundreds of applicants, we have decided to fund just a few. Money's tight, you know.
REJECTED. But. You don't agree that this is an important problem in biology? You don't think my ideas are good enough? You don't think they're innovative or cutting edge? Or is it that you think I suck as a scientist and don't have much to show? I just ripped out my brain, tied to it a thick string of my undeniable passion for this work, stuck to it a platinum list of all my past accomplishments, and served it to you on a 9-page golden platter! And it's still not good enough?!
WHAT IF. Okay, alright. What do you want? Okay. Got it. I'll fix the problems. How's it now? 2-4 months later. Sorry, not so sorry. We've run out of money. This time, we decided to fund only one researcher. Better luck next year! GAH!
#fellowshipwriting
David Garrett - Vivaldi vs Vertigo
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Jason Aldean
Jason Aldean brings me back to when I started to fall in love with Adam. I remember when we first met, I went up to his lab to find someone. I just happened to ask Adam where that person was. The first thing I remember about him is his smile. He kinda leaned back against the lab bench, folded his arms over his chest and said, "I think you just walked by him in the hallway" with the sweetest, cutest, sheepish grin on his face. And I didn't know what to do. I wondered to myself, who is this person? I've worked in this building for four years, how have I never met this person? So I said, "Oh. The guy with the pink shirt? I guess I thought he would be Korean. Oops, haha....." Smile. Smile. Smile. Gosh, that smile. That was in September. Then came the departmental retreat a few weeks later --we exchanged acknowledgements and somehow we ended up going to the Genna's on Capitol Square afterward with a bunch of work people. Again, I thought, how have I never met him! We have plenty of mutual friends! At the departmental Halloween party a month later...we made eye contacts across the Biochem atrium throughout the night. Gosh, that smile. Got me everytime. I invited him to the annual Halloween party that my roommates and I throw every year, thinking he would never show up. We had hardly exchanged 5 words to each other. But he did. We shared a dance and I caught him discretely sniffing my hair. We didn't speak or see each other again for over a month --it was a silly little crush after all. Just a handsome guy with a sweet smile who worked upstairs from me. But I found myself trying to catch glimpses of him on his floor through the open atrium (turns out he had started to take the long route to go to the bathroom, so he could try to catch glimpses of me, too).
One day, I received a message from him through Facebook to congratulate me on my new job offer in San Francisco. Oh! The boy is thinking of me! He remembers who I am! I thought happily. Then we started chatting through Facebook (lame, I know). And I kept waiting for him to disappoint me. To say something that would turn me off --because that's what usually happens. But it never came. He always made me laugh, always gave my face a ridiculous, cheesy grin. He asked if I wanted to grab a coffee at the cafe in the Microbiology building. I said yes. 20 mins, only, I told myself. Those coffee breaks came more frequently...and became longer than 20 mins. So silly! I told myself, you're moving to California! This is no time to overanalyze the situation! By the time the departmental holiday party came around late December, the chemistry between us had gotten so intense that you would need a machete to walk through. I had to leave the situation. I had to get out before I did something I would regret. I picked up my stuff and walked out of the bar. He rushed after me and we sat for what felt like hours in the planter box outside the Big 10 talking, the liquid courage bringing out the honesty and breaking down the inhibitions we both had been carrying around. Feelings were professed, Hearts were shared, Dreams were etched, What-ifs were drawn, Plans were discussed...but of course, reality also set in. I was moving to California in a little over 3 months, he was moving to Toronto in 5 months. So for the next few months, we texted. We snuck out for coffee breaks. We exchanged smiles and waves between the 3rd and 4th floors through the open atrium. We were just friends. No one could know this incredible bond that was slowly forming.
This is where Jason Aldean comes in. Every night I would work very late to write my dissertation and prepare for my thesis defense. Adam would drop by my office before he went home every night, sometimes with beef jerky (my favorite), sometimes with other snacks, sometimes with dinner, but always with many sweet and wonderful hugs, kisses, and funny stories. Every kiss was full, if you know what I mean. Every single kiss he gave me felt fully packed with his heart and his soul. Each kiss felt like how kisses were meant to be given --full of the person who's giving it to you. And my heart just grew and grew. I thought about him constantly. I felt so much happiness thinking about him. While everything else in my life was complicated and chaotic, I had a great sense of clarity. It was clear that this is as organic as love gets. Every night that late winter, I walked home in the snow, listening to this new album I had purchased by Jason Aldean and dreaming of Adam's smile, his warm hugs and genuine kisses. I would walk out of Biochem, press play on my iPhone, and Jason would serenade my dreams about this sweet boy of mine. I would only have 3 months to live this fantasy, so I savored every moment. Come April, I probably would never see him again for the rest of my life. So I savored, and cherished every single minute that I had left --even those quiet moments when he wasn't there. I allowed myself these 3 months to feel and love to my heart's content. With no boundaries of guilt, or rationale, or reason. This feeling of raw, organic love doesn't happen very often to a person in their lifetime, so I deserve to feel it completely --to drown in this hazy, crazy, love. To this day, two years later, Jason Aldean still brings me back to these late night walks home. When a song comes on the radio now, I still smile that ridiculous grin, think about those hugs and kisses, and grateful that he's at work, 5 floors down from me, and that we'll be going home together later tonight. Or when a song comes on while I am doing the dishes, I feel grateful that he's simply in the next room, playing with our cats or on his computer, and I could go out there and kiss him anytime I want.
Jason Aldean - Just Passing Through
One day, I received a message from him through Facebook to congratulate me on my new job offer in San Francisco. Oh! The boy is thinking of me! He remembers who I am! I thought happily. Then we started chatting through Facebook (lame, I know). And I kept waiting for him to disappoint me. To say something that would turn me off --because that's what usually happens. But it never came. He always made me laugh, always gave my face a ridiculous, cheesy grin. He asked if I wanted to grab a coffee at the cafe in the Microbiology building. I said yes. 20 mins, only, I told myself. Those coffee breaks came more frequently...and became longer than 20 mins. So silly! I told myself, you're moving to California! This is no time to overanalyze the situation! By the time the departmental holiday party came around late December, the chemistry between us had gotten so intense that you would need a machete to walk through. I had to leave the situation. I had to get out before I did something I would regret. I picked up my stuff and walked out of the bar. He rushed after me and we sat for what felt like hours in the planter box outside the Big 10 talking, the liquid courage bringing out the honesty and breaking down the inhibitions we both had been carrying around. Feelings were professed, Hearts were shared, Dreams were etched, What-ifs were drawn, Plans were discussed...but of course, reality also set in. I was moving to California in a little over 3 months, he was moving to Toronto in 5 months. So for the next few months, we texted. We snuck out for coffee breaks. We exchanged smiles and waves between the 3rd and 4th floors through the open atrium. We were just friends. No one could know this incredible bond that was slowly forming.
This is where Jason Aldean comes in. Every night I would work very late to write my dissertation and prepare for my thesis defense. Adam would drop by my office before he went home every night, sometimes with beef jerky (my favorite), sometimes with other snacks, sometimes with dinner, but always with many sweet and wonderful hugs, kisses, and funny stories. Every kiss was full, if you know what I mean. Every single kiss he gave me felt fully packed with his heart and his soul. Each kiss felt like how kisses were meant to be given --full of the person who's giving it to you. And my heart just grew and grew. I thought about him constantly. I felt so much happiness thinking about him. While everything else in my life was complicated and chaotic, I had a great sense of clarity. It was clear that this is as organic as love gets. Every night that late winter, I walked home in the snow, listening to this new album I had purchased by Jason Aldean and dreaming of Adam's smile, his warm hugs and genuine kisses. I would walk out of Biochem, press play on my iPhone, and Jason would serenade my dreams about this sweet boy of mine. I would only have 3 months to live this fantasy, so I savored every moment. Come April, I probably would never see him again for the rest of my life. So I savored, and cherished every single minute that I had left --even those quiet moments when he wasn't there. I allowed myself these 3 months to feel and love to my heart's content. With no boundaries of guilt, or rationale, or reason. This feeling of raw, organic love doesn't happen very often to a person in their lifetime, so I deserve to feel it completely --to drown in this hazy, crazy, love. To this day, two years later, Jason Aldean still brings me back to these late night walks home. When a song comes on the radio now, I still smile that ridiculous grin, think about those hugs and kisses, and grateful that he's at work, 5 floors down from me, and that we'll be going home together later tonight. Or when a song comes on while I am doing the dishes, I feel grateful that he's simply in the next room, playing with our cats or on his computer, and I could go out there and kiss him anytime I want.
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| My last day in Madison |
Jason Aldean - Just Passing Through
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