May is a birthday month - a large percentage of my family celebrate their birthday this month, myself included. When I am in Brazil it is a month full of parties, my family loves excuses to get together and be together. The phone rings all day with calls from well-wishers; my e-mail is full of happy messages.
However, among all the messages and presents, the birthday data was the best of all. After eight months of optimizing the assay and setting up the screen, then the four months of screening of less than half of the population, I was getting worried that I was wasting my time and effort. Oh the joy of seeing ten candidates emerge after two days of struggling with data analysis was very encouraging - especially with the conference I am attending coming up in two weeks!
This birthday is a big one, even though it is not the big one. I feel the impact of 35, but I was not dreading the date as I did before I turned 30. I now have many things to celebrate, such as two adorable sons, a big house and a job for the next four years. My life seems stable enough, my project seems to be coming together. I still want things, but I do not feel like I need anything - other than first author publications...
No comments:
Post a Comment