Everything Under the Sun

As I sit here a year later writing again to the last 365 days, I think about where I've been, what I've seen and done, the crests and the troughs, the people still by my side, and the one's I no longer see or hear from. I think about what the future holds. In many ways 2019 for me could be seen through the same lens of pattern recognition that 2018 and the last 10 years before it could. In a less dramatic sense, I pressed on, "in the face of aridity and disenchantment" (Desiderata), achieving great things, seeing more of the world, and experiencing new lows that I could not have predicted. I traveled to 10 US cities, lived in the Southeast, Midwest and the Northwest, witnessed extreme poverty in Colombia juxtaposed by connection and joy, drove 3000 miles from Florida to Seattle, aged another year, and had the time of my life with my family in the Southwest, completing what some consider to be the scariest hike in America. I advanced my career, advanced my learni...

Thirteen. Unlucky for most, but lucky for me. The number of times I've seen someone bleed. Only in my mind when I have imagined, The contributions of strangers, hard to fathom. Hard to fathom, the volume of compassion.  Gathered from bodies of individuals that matter. A uniquely human cycle, no other I’d rather,  One day a contributor, the next a benefactor. Giving the gift of life, celebrated every day thereafter. Thirteen, The number of times I will bleed, To return what's not rightfully me. To people in a world full of a need.

Rarity is interesting. It is unsparing and unprecedented. If something is rare, then the patterns of logical reasoning we do in our brains to predict future outcomes are not comforting. We can't trust them. So then, if someone begins to present with uncommon circumstances multiple times to the point where it becomes statistically rare, how can they predict their own future at all? And if it's related to their mortality, how can they put themselves to sleep at night... In the US its estimated that 907,000 people have Ulcerative Colitis. Of patients that are diagnosed with UC, around 4% present symptoms before age 5. That's 36,280 people. Typically, 25-40% of patients with UC end up needing to have their large intestine removed. If you take an average of 32.5% of patients and apply it to the 36,280 that we got earlier, you get 11,791 people in the US that will be diagnosed around 5 years old and then subsequently have the surgery. In what we could refer to as very uncommon,...

When we reflect on a period of time we often look to the highlights of the specific duration to create an image of what occurred.   The moments of personal loss or failure, the incredible destinations traveled, the bucket list items checked, the achievements made and the goals conquered.  But we often forget all the small moments that filled considerable time when summed together. It’s to these moments that a year belongs. To the 20 minutes laying in bed trying to fall asleep, 365 days of the year. To the 691 meals shared with others or consumed in solo introspection. It’s to the 1002 “I love you’s”, the 198 tough conversations, the 860 laughs, and the context with which all of these occurred.  Brutality and difficulty underscored one side of the juxtaposition that was the year of 2018, while blessings, discovery, and promising new beginnings filled the metaphorical “yang” of that two sided coin. So much to be thankful for. And much of it at a cost. A debt ...