Blah blah blah, so many reasons I could list here on why it’s a complete no-brainer to donate towards the fight against cancer—especially the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, really a wonderful organization. If you donate through my page this week, you can make sure every buck you send goes straight towards the fight for pediatric cancer. I’ve started a little competition with my dear friend Mr. Eliot Hayes to see who can raise more.
Anywho, about all these reasons—let’s focus on just two. One very important, and one boring, drawn-out one I expect you’ll just gloss over as you reluctantly make your way over to the donation box.
Here’s the first (and main) reason: can’t let Eliot win this. Look, I like the guy, but damn, if you met him… He’s a good-looking, tall, brilliant, clever, charming, charismatic, athletic, witty—the list could go on and on. Me, on the other hand, on a good day I’m what you would call “personality-first attractive,” and even then, he’s probably got me beat from a personality perspective. Anyways, per usual, he’s been more organized and ahead of the game here, so we’ve got some catching up to do.
Secondly (and less importantly), here’s the thing: it’s a really important and good cause. I think at this point in my life, I’m pretty qualified to make that judgment. I spent about six months of my life trapped in a single ward fighting AML. My experience was weird—it was short and intense. Within nine months from my May 26th, freshman-year-of-high-school diagnosis, my hair had fully regrown, I’d gained back most of my weight, and other than my slightly pale skin, there really wasn’t anything that would’ve hinted at this guy having gone through everything I had. All that to say, I think that made it a lot easier to sort of gloss over, if that makes any sense. And honestly, I went a long while without really processing it, until one day I looked back and sort of realized I had dodged a freight train. Though, I think looking at it all these years later—finally ready to process things—I realize the way it truly shifted the course of my life.
I don’t think any stretch of my imagination would have put money on me teaching (or trying to) a bunch of little seven-year-old first graders in Nashville, Tennessee right out of college. Half the time, I still think I’m just as small and scrappy as all the starry-eyed kids that call me Mr. Gross-Loh. I really don’t know what led me to this decision. I know I didn’t exactly want to go straight into finance (no offense to anyone in finance… but we would all be very grateful for the donations that you might provide), but at times teaching feels like it may have been a slight overcorrection. I do love it, though.
After giving it some thought, I think I was really chasing meaning. I think if I extracted any ideas from my experience, it was that I was given a second shot—an opportunity to live a life where I actually get to be aware of how quickly things could turn around. And that’s been damn valuable. Not really sure what things are going to hold in the future, and this teaching stuff is pretty tough. But I do know this: I get to wake up every day and live a life that, at one point, wasn’t guaranteed. And that’s only possible because of research. Because of people who decided this was worth a penny.
So anyways, don’t let this dude Eliot win… and also I think it’d be pretty cool to give as many kids second chances as well.
And look, if you’ve made it this far, you might as well leave a few bucks.
Ps: just a thought I’ve had for a while, I had a type of leukemia called AML Leukemia. AML stands for Acute Myeloid Leukemia. But if youre calling it aml leukemia isn’t that technically acute myeloid leukemia leukemia. Just thought id share. Anyways, have a nice day thanks for reading.