If we ask for help we can make it through

Which student is more likely to get into Stanford? The student who takes all AP classes and has some B grades, or the student who gets all As but takes some regular classes?

It’s a question the admissions counselors get all the time, and the answer of course is that Stanford takes the student who takes all AP classes and gets all As.

It’s an infuriatingly unhelpful answer, and the counselors know that. But I feel like I’ve gotten myself into that dilemma here, a bit. Is it better to consistently deliver posts, but occasionally have a post that is maybe shorter or less helpful than usual? Or is it better to consistently deliver quality posts, but occasionally have to miss a day of posting? Well, today’s is a bit late, but hopefully the quality is still here.

I’ve mentioned before that I have a pretty serious health issue that I’ve been struggling with for years now. Although we have finally gotten it largely under control in the last year or so, it’s by no means gone, and one thing I’m still struggling with is that it’s never going to be completely gone. I’m struggling with it now, and I’m going to continue struggling with it for the rest of my life. And right now, well, it’s reared its ugly head again, so I’m going to the doctor tomorrow, and I have no idea what to do. I feel like I should be able to do something. How do I make it better? What can I do?

There is nothing I can do. I have to accept that I need help, and right now, that’s all there is to do. Maybe shed a few tears, and accept that I’m scared, and try to get some more sleep.

I was talking to my parents last night, and my father pointed out that yesterday was Pearl Harbor day. “The people there never asked to be heroes,” he said. They just happened to be there, and when bombs started falling, they just had to do whatever they could do to survive. “A lot of what makes people great isn’t what they set out to do,” he continued, “it’s just what they do given the circumstances.”

It may not be bombs falling on my head, but my illness is something that I never set out to have. I don’t want to be sick! But I do have it, it’s in my life, and my choice is only how I live with it.

I always loved Coit Tower; such a wonderful monument to the city’s firefighters…