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I cringe every time I read or hear someone is “fighting cancer or battling cancer”. This language implies a war, which means there is a winner and a loser. I’m betting you know someone who died from cancer and you also know that person was anything but a loser. I realize it’s difficult to know…

When I think of Michael, many of the images I have of him are often frozen in the seventh grade. That school year, by some stroke of luck, he, Bridget and I all had lockers next to each other. Everyday when I got to my locker, I could always count on Michael to greet me…

When I hear 90% cure rate for childhood cancers I want to scream or possibly throw up!  That stat is SO misleading.  That stat is talking about surviving 5 years.   Living with cancer for five years IS NOT CURING cancer!  Especially if you are 6 years old when you are diagnosed.  This steers research…

In the summer of 2015, before starting my third year at Pomona College, I decided to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. More specifically, I decided that a long walk along the western geological spine of the continental United States from Mexico to Canada was a goal that could not be left to slowly erode over…

Looking down at these hands of mine I see calluses rimmed with dirt dotting their landscapes, cuts and scabs joining my mountainous knuckles to the valleys in the topography of my palms, and vast clearing of exposed flesh encircling my nails. I see bloodied skin dangling from my right pointer finger from the time it…