HOLIDAYS PAST Winter in the Northern Hemisphere is a season I look forward to enjoying. For me and my family, it is get-togethers at Christmas; for nearby friends it is gatherings for Hanukkah or Kwanzaa; and we all look forward to welcoming the New Year. Before my cancer diagnosis I remember starting to put up [...]

WE CAN ALL BE ADVOCATES I have worked in a number of different positions over the years, but my most recent one – as an ovarian cancer research advocate – is the one I have worked at the longest. During the spring of 2006, as I finished my 9th cycle of chemotherapy for stage 3b [...]

LOOKING BACK AND LOOKING FORWARD In January 2006, five months after my diagnosis, I wasn’t really sure what my future would hold. Would I be able to finish all the chemo treatments? Would I be able to travel to all 50 states in my lifetime? (A personal goal of mine.) Would I be able to [...]

MIRRORS AND WINDOWS A few weeks ago I read this quote by Rudine Sims Bishop. “Books are sometimes windows, offering views of world… When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror… Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books.” I started to [...]