My writing schedule has been extremely erratic this year because I don’t have as much time these days. But it’s almost the end of the year and 2025 is just around the corner. It’s time to take a pause and reflect on the year that has been. Not just the milestones, the giggles, the cherished moments, but also the chaos, the tears. The trips that did not happen or the goals not reached. Of the mistakes I made, the words I wish I had not said, or the chances I did not take.

Of the cherished times, worth mentioning is my visit to India during spring earlier this year. Since our wedding, this was the first time my spouse and I had traveled to see our family together. It was incredibly rewarding to reconnect with my family. So much changes in the span of a couple of years! We soaked in the intoxicating smells, sounds and sights of everything we grew up around, from the walls of my childhood home to walks in the alleys where we went to college, places we used to visit during our courtship days! It was overwhelming in a good way and made me feel alive! The best part was my mother flew with us to the United States and stayed with us for a couple of months. The bond she developed with our furbaby, the memories we created- I will always keep them close to my heart.

Healthwise, this year has been full of ups and downs for me. The year started with a strange pain in my right hips and legs and left flank. My medical journey took me from one specialist to another, one diagnostic test to the other. After a long list of imaging and bloodwork, and a few thousands of dollars out of pocket, most of my doctors are now washing their hands off because they cannot seem to find anything wrong. And the fact that I otherwise seem fine and not unhealthy or sick further contributes to them not taking my symptoms seriously. I have repeatedly asked for more tests, more bloodwork, of the rarer markers. But I could not persuade them. One of my doctors prescribed a medication meant to treat chronic complex pain which is helping to some extent. It did make it possible for me to go back to the gym which was unimaginable to me at the start of the year. However, the medication did not alleviate all my symptoms. At this point, I am still living in crippling uncertainty, hoping to find an answer to what my body is trying to tell me before it’s too late. And all this health battle also started to affect my mental health. I felt fatigued, and overwhelmed at times. But I really want to take a moment to applaud my husband for his silent yet steadfast support in my struggles. I know that as long as he is with me, come what may, together, we will push through.

In all, this year taught me to stop trying to control everything and to surrender to what I cannot change. I learnt a valuable lesson, that I cannot fix everything. Sometimes all we need to do is show up and embrace life’s messiness and uncertainties. The fact that I made it to the year end, I feel proud for not giving up when it was the darkest, and clinging to optimism for brighter days. I have withstood health issues and faced demons that others might never know about, and I did my best. I woke up every day and showed up for life. Even on days my body felt like it almost broke me, I showed up as if every day was a new opportunity, and got through the day. I kept reminding myself of the wonderful privileges I have, that I don’t have to, but I get to. I tried to be as happy and upbeat as possible. I kept living the best I could. I survived. And that to me, is enough. That to me, is a victory.

I don’t know what 2025 has in store for me. More storm or sunshine. Will I find answers to my undiagnosed health issues and be able to resolve them? I don’t know. But I will hold on to hope. I will hold on to love. I will hold on to healing. I look forward to things hopefully improving in the new year. I look forward to more family time, increased laughter and more memories.

Happy holidays and happy new year 2025 in advance!

“There’s a certain nostalgia and romance in a place you left.”-David Guterson

I was born and raised in India before moving to the United States in my mid-twenties to pursue higher education. If you have been reading my writings, you may already be aware of this. I grew up in India in the nineties just before globalization took hold. Three and a half decades gone by, yet it feels just like yesterday. I grew up in an era when life was simpler with no mobile phones or tablets, high speed wifi, Netflix, Mcdonalds or social media, and we, as children, could find happiness in the simpler things like making paper boats in the rain, playing FLAMES with our friends, watching Ramayana or Mahabharata on the TV with the entire family, or getting new clothes once a year during Durga Puja, our biggest festival. Fast forward to 2012- I boarded a flight to come to this country, leaving my roots behind and embracing a new culture in an unknown land with the hope of building a new life here.

How do you explain the emotional aspect of immigration to someone who has lived their entire life in one place, surrounded by the same people? It somewhat resembles a wound that never gets better. The raw pain from the wound reminds you of your motherland, the home you grew up in, the aromas of the shukto and macher jhol prepared by your mother that cannot be replaced anywhere else. Whatsapp or Facetime cannot proxy for the favorite places in your childhood city, conversing with people in your mother tongue, or being able to hug your parents. The crippling dread of missing out and becoming irrelevant in the lives of your near and dear ones while you are gone. However, with time, as you train yourself to love and accustom yourself to the new place, immerse yourself in the new culture and build a new life with new friends who now are family, the wound somewhat heals, but the scar tissue remains serving as a memory of your former life. It also reminds you of the courage- without which you could not have traveled this path and made it; the roadblocks you encountered and overcame and how they molded you into who you are at present.

People often ask me, “do you like it better in the US?” “Don’t you miss your family in India?” And it’s not easy to answer. Having two places to call home on different sides of the world has been a privilege, a roller coaster adventure as well as a struggle. But after moving two countries and four cities, I have realized that the concept of home is very abstract and can mean a lot of things. It does not need to be a specific zip code. You can create a home anywhere in the earth. It’s just a vessel where you create beautiful memories with the people you love. My childhood home in India, where I grew up with my parents and have countless fond memories, will always be my home. However, I have made each of the American cities I have lived in thus far my home too. Yes, there are and will continue to be days when I wonder if it is worth it. There are moments when I wish to leave everything here and go back to my childhood home in my motherland. But then I also remember that this feeling of heaviness in my chest is the consequence of some of the bravest choices I have made to build a better life for myself and that it’s just part of the package. And that, without it, I would not be the person I am today.

Baba,

I barely ever have time to write these days. But I had hoped to do so today. It is hard to think that you have been gone for two years already. It still feels like yesterday, yet I’m not sure if a lifetime has already passed. Before it was a day ago… a week ago…. a month ago… one year ago.. Today, it is two years ago. Soon it will be five years, ten years. Grief is hard. It is so fucking hard. And yet, life goes on. You see, the hardest part for me is thinking about the pain, fear and loneliness you felt at the ICU during your final days. And that you did not get to see your family before you left us. On days, it jabs me hard with a pain so sharp.

In my dreams, I occasionally see you. Never before have I told anyone about this. But sometimes, especially when I’m grieving greatly for you, you come to me in my dreams. Some say our dreams are wish fulfilment. While others say bad dreams are the mind’s way of smoothing over a past trauma through repeated exposure to it. Is it the reason you only appear in my dreams to show me your last few hours and I am holding your hand through it? Is it because it will remain my greatest regret not being able to be there with you when you needed us the most?

I visited Ma last year. For the first time in my life you were not there when I entered our home. It was the first time Ma and I met since you died. It felt so strange to see Ma doing groceries to feed me. I grew up seeing you do the groceries everyday at 7am in the morning, running to the neighborhood farmers before the freshest vegetables ran out. The morning cup of tea in our verandah- without you asking for more cookies, baba, it wasn’t the same. You should have accompanied Ma to the airport to see me and say goodbye, but you left us so early. I am trying to take care of Ma as best as I can. But she can be very stubborn at times. She now has been diagnosed with high cholesterol. And I am constantly worrying about her. But the great news is, she can now video call, take pictures on the phone and send them to me.

What has happened in our lives since you passed? We have been greened. We moved to Boston towards the end of last year and now work in biotech/Pharma companies. Waffle is growing older with us. As I am writing this, she is bringing me toys to play with her. Now that I am growing older, I realize I am so much like you baba. You have left so much of yourself in me. I perhaps got the love for dogs from you. How I wished you could visit me here and get to meet Waffle!

Baba, as I thought of you today, I became aware that the painful images of how ill and weak you were in your final days was gradually receding. Although I will always hold the loneliness, anguish, and pain you experienced in your last few days in my heart, I now possess the fortitude to replace those memories with ones of our joyful times together. Ones that, seemed trivial at that time, but are priceless now.

I love you so much. Ma and I miss you everyday. I pray that wherever you are, you are at peace. I know you are looking out and can see us all. And that you will always be with me in spirits as I walk the miles I have yet to cover without you by my side.

Until we meet again baba…

I will come straight to the point on this one. Mental health issues such as depression and anxiety among graduate students are increasing at a worrisome rate worldwide and can be attributed to a variety of factors but not limited to the immense pressure of performing and publishing in peer reviewed journals, secure funding in the current brutally hyper competitive market, land a job after your PhD, the poor pay scale of the students, especially during inflation making it almost impossible to make both ends meet among others. During our PhDs, many of us end up working in the lab for more than 12-14 hours a day putting our own health at risk. Add to this lack of sleep, a clean eating routine and the constant pressure of meeting deadlines, presentations, meetings, courses, and exams (especially in the first two years). It is more difficult for people like I who moved to a different country, away from family and friends to pursue their PhD. There would always be a feeling of isolation in the unknown city and loneliness. It drove me to a very dark place for a very long time. Although I came back with the help of my very supportive and loving husband and a few close friends, I learnt a few wise lessons.

Mental health lessons I learnt during my PhD

• Compare yourself with yourself. Productivity and success (peer reviewed publications) needs to be defined in your own terms. It might not look the same for you and your peers. Your friend in the same academic year published in his/her second year of PhD whereas it took you six years to do so. It imbibes a shame that you are perhaps not good enough. But please know that this alone is not a measure of your productivity. Productivity might not even look the same every day. And this is okay! It is important to remember that this is your journey and yours alone. It is important to accept that there will be lows. There will be weeks or even months when all your experiments will fail. You will feel like giving up. But it is crucial to know that the struggles you face and the troubleshooting you do only add depths to your scientific maturity at the end of the process. I realized this when I started my postdoc career.
• Recognize the red flags and the toxic triggers in your workplace before it is too late. As PhD students, we end up spending the biggest chunk of our day in the laboratory working with our peers and the lab becomes our second home. Therefore, what happens in the lab potentially affects our mental wellbeing. While some of us are fortunate to have supportive PIs and colleagues, others experience severe emotional challenges due to hostile work environment. Over the course of my academic career of 10years, I have seen and met many toxic lab PIs and co-researchers. I know a few people who believe staying in the lab till late night will define whether you are working hard. I know, it sucks! Few of my close friends also suffered silently in abusive labs. Sometimes, it is not easy to switch to a different lab or report the PI or the coworker(s).
• Take a step back and pause. While it is important to meet deadlines, it is equally important to devote some time for self-care. At first, it may feel like you are devoting less time for research but trust me. In the long run, this will only make things better. For me, a bit of stress and having a deadline helps me to stay streamlined and brings out the most productivity from me. But as I moved on from my PhD to postdoc, and now to a corporate job, I have realized the difference in the fine balance between the beneficial stress that can push you to do better and the overwhelming one that can throw you into the pits. It will be a lie if I said I can always balance my work stress, no, I cannot. But I am working on this.
• Seek help from the resources available to you. Majority of the students do not talk about their mental health due to the stigma associated with it or the lack of access to mental healthcare. I personally immensely benefitted from talking to a therapist when my PhD journey hit rock bottom.
• Try not to bring your work stress home. I have learnt from my own mistakes. It is normal to have a crappy day at work and feel devastated. It is also perfectly okay to share it with your partner or spouse at the end of the day when you come home. But do not let the work stress affect your relationship. They don’t deserve this. Neither do you.
• If doing a PhD has been your dream, then this roller coaster ride will emotionally drain you. Remember, while your work is important, it does not define your entire existence. Do not alienate your family and loved ones. Identify your tribe and keep them close- they are the ones who will support you during your meltdown moments.

Moving is scary. It is a massive undertaking. Moving to a new city for a career change takes that stress and amplifies it manifold. I have moved to a new city a total of three times so far in my life. First was ten years ago when I moved from India to the US to pursue my PhD. The second was when I moved to Nashville with my husband to train for my post doctorate work. This was the place where my husband and I started living together for the first time since our marriage. We built memories here, bit by bit, laugh by laugh. It’s the place where we adopted our first dog- Princess Waffle who also happens to be the best dog in the entire world! I was starting to get very comfortable with the life we built for ourselves here and then the pandemic happened. Poof. Two years passed in the blink of an eye. After two life altering events including one traumatic personal loss, I was ready for a big career change. I decided to transition from academia to industrial research.

Two and a half months ago, I moved to Boston- the mecca of biotech and pharmaceutical research and the city of dreams, ‘sapno ka sheher’ for many. Moving to a big city like Boston alone without my husband scared me. After having seen the good, bad and the ugly of a LDR, I was not ready for another one. It is undeniably hard and inflicts a lot of emotional damage. It always feels like I exist in two places- half here and the rest in Nashville with my husband and our fur baby. After moving to Boston, I had to relearn to be on my own. Finding a temporary housing and living with two complete strangers as roommates was not fun. There have been days when I came back home from work and broke down because I missed by family. I was so intimidated by the public transportation system when I first got here. I am ashamed to admit that I still avoid changing from red to green or orange line in the T and uber instead if I need to go somewhere other than work! On top of everything, settling down in the new office and befriending new people at work is no simple task either, especially for an introvert and socially awkward person like myself.

However, the scariest things in life can also be rewarding at times. Boston is a busy city. And you get a weird contentment after being part of the same big city hustle that every individual here is going through. There is also no greater joy than discovering your new favorite chai joint in the city or correctly following the GPS and reaching a new park by the riverfront (well, sometimes!) or making a new best friend in an adorable doggie named Turbo while commuting the T!

And now, finally, I am gearing up to fly back to Nashville for one last time to help my husband and Princess Waffle move to Boston. How do you say goodbye to a city that was your home for four years? Nashville was our home. I am lucky enough to feel this way about more than one city. But I read somewhere that you merely lose the vessel, not the memories and that you just have to build a new place to hold them.

How long will we live in Boston? Will we build the next phase of our life and grow old here? I guess we will find out!

Baba,

It’s been almost a year since you left us. The last few days leading up to the first anniversary of your death are very difficult. Sometimes, I think: ”did that really happen?” It still feels like yesterday. People pass away constantly. People lose parents or family or friends all the time. Yet, when it happens to us, we think, “no one can understand how painful it is and how much it hearts.” I will never get over losing you. I will always wish our family did not get affected by the COVID pandemic. I will never get over how it stole you at a premature age from us. Everything in my life changed since you left us. And I still struggle every single day to put the pieces of my life back together. I feel this barrage of emotions- grief, guilt, anger, emptiness. I always feel a baseline of sadness. There is not a single day when your absence is not an undercurrent in my thoughts. It feels like running an exhausting yet never ending mental marathon for the rest of my life. When you left us, I grieved angry at the world that did not experience loss of a loved one to COVID but also comforting myself thinking about so many others who have had it much worse. But I now think it is not about who had it better or worse. All of us are now connected due to the trauma of losing family to the pandemic.

Even though my eyes dampen time and again, but I don’t cry anymore. I rarely have a breakdown these days. I go about my busy life. We have taken a few trips since you died. I make food. I play with our dog. I laugh. I watch movies. I go out for dinners. Yet, I never talk to Ma about you. I have been too scared to go through your messages or pictures on my phone. I cannot watch medical dramas or any hospital scene in a movie anymore. The other day I spoke for two hours about you with a colleague who recently lost her father and I felt a strong connection. It’s weird how grief unites people.

I love you, Baba. And I miss you. Every day, every single minute. Life is beautiful and you should have been here to enjoy it. You were 65, dads are not supposed to die at 65. They are supposed to live to be older and crankier and more annoying over time. But now you are gone and our life is empty. It’s wrong. Everything feels wrong. I wish I had hugged you more. I thought we had time. I wish we could make new memories together. I wish you and Ma could visit us in the US again- just like others’ parents. I wish I could see you get older. I wish you would call me so I could hear your voice again. I wish we could take a walk together and talk about things. I hoped and prayed that you would beat COVID. We fought against your disease together and gave each other strength through that unimaginable struggle. My heart feels so heavy from all this love for you that everyone calls grief, and I am tired. But I know you will always be with me in spirit and are there helping me as I attempt to rebuild my life, minute by minute, day by day, week by week, month by month. I know you will always watch over me as I try to exist in the spaces without you.

I lost my dad to COVID on June 8^th, 2021. He was a fighter. He fought valiantly in the ICU for more than a month. We, as a family, fought the battle together. And we lost. While I am still in denial over his death and keep hoping I am stuck in a terrible nightmare and that all this would be over the moment I woke up- all this while I am struggling to come to terms with reality. I am trying to figure out a lot of things at the same time. I am googling a lot of articles that mentions how to cope with grief after losing a parent, grief after losing dad, father daughter quotes. Trust me, I have looked at a large number of articles aimed at helping one handle grief after losing a parent, I have reached out to my friends who recently lost their loved ones to COVID and I have not found one single answer so far.

            Ours was a harrowing experience similar to many others. My dad was quarantining at home following development of COVID symptoms. We decided to hospitalize him when his oxygen levels started dipping. Unfortunately, at that time, India was reeling under a devastating second wave of COVID which resulted in almost zero availability of hospital beds. He had to wait for 5-6hrs outside the ER of a hospital just to be told they could not admit him but would support him with oxygen for a couple of hours while we searched for vacancy in other hospitals in the city. We had been calling all possible hospitals and nursing homes frantically and luckily found an ICU bed in one of the well-known hospitals. We were relieved. Unfortunately, by that time, my dad’s oxygen saturation had dipped dangerously. However, we did not lose hope. Thus, began our month-long journey fighting for dad’s recovery. We lost track of day and time. I hardly ate or slept. Our life got molded into a fixed routine- we would call the hospital at 6am every morning to find out about dad. Then we would wait for him to wake up, have his tea after which he would video call me. I would just sit on the couch until he called, refusing to shower or eat. His oxygen requirements were very high the first week, but he remained conscious the whole time and did not develop any respiratory distress. He did develop the cytokine storm though. However, from third week onwards, his health began to improve, giving us a little more hope every day. It was a battle we needed to win for him. I would constantly tell him that his health was improving, and that doctors were hopeful he would return home soon.

            On the other hand, I also had to emotionally support my mother who was also quarantining alone at home. I tried to convince her that with each passing day, dad was getting better and that he would come back home and live a long life with us. My mother would spend her days thinking what she would cook for dad after he came back home or how she would need to care for him post COVID. It was a herculean task for me because India was under a second lockdown and I was stuck here in the US unable to fly back home to be with them during this tough time of our lives. But our days were now gradually feeling brighter until Monday morning, June 7^th when suddenly dad’s parameters started going haywire. With each hour his health destabilized and he was moved to ventilation. And a little after midnight, he left us for a better place, free of all pains he was suffering from.

Our world was devastatingly torn apart.

            Ever since, I have been struggling to cope with the grief. For the first two days, I allowed myself to weep. It is hard to explain the thoughts that came to my mind and slowly ate me from inside. The fact that I could not be with dad during his final days and could not see him one last time- that I would never see or be able to touch him again ripped me apart. I kept looking at the messages he sent me from his ICU bed. The ones I waited for every day- that he could finish his meal, days when felt better or had his medicines. The very thought that he would never send me those messages again felt like a stabbing pain in my chest. I kept on thinking about our last conversation. I kept on asking myself: was I a good daughter? Did I do enough? What else could I have done to ensure his recovery? I felt like a complete failure, having promised both dad and mom that we would bring him back home after full recovery and then failing to do so. I wished to die to be with him. My own existence felt unbearable. My grief gradually turned into anger towards my husband. He had stood like a rock supporting me the entire time. But I was mean and angry. I refused to acknowledge that he was trying to help. All I could think was how would he understand my pain? His parents are still alive.

There are not enough words to embody the heartbreak I am feeling right now. The sorrow is unexplainable. Our friends and family were also mourning, sending us condolences. My father’s colleagues have told me that they have not just lost a wonderful co-worker but an elder brother. But after a point, messages and condolences stop as people move on with their lives. And we are left to live with our grief and a heartache which probably will never go away.

            Time passes. But does the grief lessen or get better with time? No, it does not. Losing a parent changes us forever. We will never be the same again. We simply learn to live with the grief. I went back to work from last Monday, a week after my dad left us. I have stopped sharing how I feel as a rule now, even with my husband. But at odd hours, grief just sits there as a lump in my throat or like a cloudburst behind my eyes. I allow myself to breakdown, in office restrooms or at home when nobody else is around. I wish I had called my dad more, pestered him more about his health updates. I wish I could drink that last glass of single malt whiskey with him. I wish I had cooked more for him when he visited me in the US a few years back. Whenever I look at his picture or light a candle in his memory, I feel hollow.

I read somewhere that grief is nothing but love that we want to give but cannot. It is all the unspent love that is now trapped. I am slowly trying to accept that I will perhaps grieve forever. The hurting will never go away for as long as I am alive. But life has to go on. It will go on. And I have to move on and rise again, for my dad. I have to take care of myself, my family, and fulfill his dreams.

Dec 16th, 2020

With the number of COVID-19 cases still growing, the “new normal” lifestyle has restricted our research activities. Most of the research labs in our university are still functioning at a reduced capacity to maintain social distancing regulations. The COVID-19 pandemic has made it nearly impossible for us to do what we are best at: plan and conduct bench side experiments at an aggressive pace. During the lockdown mandate earlier this year, we accepted the grim reality of stalled science. Most researchers initially turned to reading and improve their prior knowledge. As we entered the third or fourth week of lockdown and working from home, we scrambled for a plan B: how best to remotely work with existing data, or write manuscripts or grant proposals, to name a few.

During the initial phase of the “stay at home” mandate, I designed elaborate plans on how to best utilize my time and fantasized about the projects I would now be able to undertake and accomplish. I decided I would not spend the entire day reading about COVID news and panic. My husband and I also made a pact not to binge watch shows on Netflix or scroll down social networking platforms. We even deleted facebook app from our phones. News channels were broadcasting news related to COVID every hour. This also added to our anxiety. There was so much loss, pain and grief all around the world! All this had a negative impact on us, especially on my husband’s mental health. I therefore decided to update myself on COVID related statistics only once daily. Instead, I wanted to go back to the full texts that I had bookmarked or noted down in my notebook but could never find enough time to read in my everyday busy schedule. I had also signed up for several webinars and online classes to learn how to code and new bioinformatics skills which would significantly help my research project in the future. To add to this, we had weekly virtual lab meetings and coffee hours added to our calendar, to brainstorm new or existing project ideas and discuss most recent publications. In summary, I had schemed achievable targets in the three-four weeks of lockdown time.

It started off well! I would wake up at 7am and walk our dog. Then, I would make myself a cup of tea and sit down in front of my computer. I successfully met the deadline for a project I had started to work on earlier. I was reading one new research paper every day. I learnt one new software to analyze our research data. I wrote two new science communications articles for our university website. I was regularly working out, with our dog going nuts at the sight of resistance bands and kettlebells! Since we were confined to our home, instead of opting for take outs or frozen food, my husband and I were taking turns to cook fresh meals every day. Despite a few distractions like, a brief one-hour afternoon nap, I still had enough time on my daily calendar to check all that I had planned for.

However, things started going downhill fast. Soon, none of my plans stuck. My typical workday was starting to look bleak. We quickly realized that the lockdown was not going to end anytime soon. And, very soon, my productivity hit an all time low. All the elaborate plans, possibilities and expectations turned into pressure. I was beginning to feel overwhelmed. This futile urge to overachieve, especially during the present global crisis started taking its toll on me. I felt like a failure not being able to do enough with all the extra time I had now. To add to this, it was difficult to ignore peer pressure- colleagues who were making the most of this lockdown time. And all this happened without us falling into a more lethargic lifestyle. Some days were manageable, with zoom meetings and discussions about work, when the lockdown would be relaxed, and we would go back to work. Felt reassuring when a colleague shares pictures about a cake he baked with his son or a fish tank he cleaned, may be instead of learning to code or reading a newly published article. Once a week, I would go to my lab for a few hours to take care some essential business. But, on other days, the anxiety was heavy on my chest. Every night, I told myself that I would start working out the next day and also get back to serious reading. I waited for the “perfect day” to start that first tutorial on coding. But then, I would be consumed by all these emotions. Was I trying hard enough? Would my job survive the pandemic? When would I publish?

Around middle of the year, the lockdown was lifted in phases and we slowly started going back to our labs. Even then, we were allowed to work in shifts which meant we got half of the actual time we normally would. My friends in a similar and comparable field of research would agree that most of the biology related experiments need more than half day to get done. So, even though we were back at work, the progress was severely compromised. We achieved in a couple of months what we would otherwise accomplish in two weeks. I would be extremely disheartened by all this. To add to this, I could not go home and visit my parents and extended family. I would constantly worry about them, sitting here, hundreds of miles away from home.

I had thought of writing science communication articles only on this blog, which I will, in future. Today, I am voicing out my thoughts, because I am sure many of us felt the same way. As we continue to live a world threatened by the COVID pandemic and steadily increasing deaths still, there is no denying that it is a scary and terrifying time, one that none of us experienced before. Masks, sanitizers and social distancing are the new normal now. Visiting friends or date nights are a strict no no. So far, this is what my life has been in this pandemic year. These are difficult days. I am trying to combat this, one day at a time. I am trying to convince myself that it is probably okay to not be one hundred percent productive. That it is still okay to feel overwhelmed. It is perhaps okay to just sit down on the deck chair and spend three hours with my husband and our dog, cherish and count my blessings. It is okay to believe that I will still be good at my job even though I have not managed to learn how to code or read all my bookmarked research articles during the lockdown. And it is okay to believe that I am doing the best I can now. Finally, Christmas and New Year are almost here! We have survived the pandemic together. I am sure with the vaccine roll out, things will start to get better soon!

Today is 7^th May 2020. In a perfect world, I would be boarding my flight today to Honolulu for attending an immunology conference! But of course, everything is canceled. Full disclosure. I was really upset when the conference got canceled. Now, come on, who would not look forward to an all expenses covered trip to Hawaii? I was excited at the prospect of attending talks from distinguished scientists and interact with researchers from different parts of the world. And then, like everyone else, we would explore the city and have some fun in the evening. My colleague had purchased tickets well in advance to go swimming with the sharks. I wanted to go snorkeling. So much so that one night I even dreamt that I was snorkeling in the pristine waters of Hawaii. Oh, the places you can go in your dreams! Clearly, our conference and the highly desired trip to Hawaii, now canceled, were topics for discussion in our lab’s virtual coffee hour yesterday. Another colleague of mine, who was also supposed to attend this conference suggested we make some margaritas and drink from coconut shells at home!

So, with a somewhat heavy heart, I woke up in the morning today and sat down in front of my computer, with a glass of freshly made fruit smoothie in my hand. I opened the window to let in some fresh cool and crispy air from outside. It is a beautiful calm morning. Our dog, Waffle, just sat down in front of me with her soulful “puppy eyes”, trying to convince me to play “fetch” with her. But I am determined to start my first sci comm article for my blog today.

As I write, I just heard the news that our city will be entering Phase I of reopening post lockdown next Monday and we get to go back to work, at a severely reduced efficiency of course. Woohoo! I definitely will drink to that today (literally)!