My apologies for being uncharacteristically late to the party... or rather for showing up while everyone else is cleaning the Doritos out of the couch and tossing the empty beer bottles in the bin.

There's always a running joke amongst benchmonkeys that goes something like, "If this whole science thing doesn't work out, then I'll..."

•      - Open a coffee shop in Hawaii
•      - Run a restaurant/bakery
•      - Start a combination icecream/cocktail truck (that will make stops at all area research institutes)
•      - Run for Congress
•      - Work for the FBI/CIA/NSA

Such commentaries are born out of long-held dreams, hobbies, or unexpected skills acquired during our careers, among other things. What's my thing? I would be a writer.

For many, writing is tantamount to torture. Not for me. I love to tell stories. Reality, fiction. Science, adventure, drama. Short, long. An audience of one or 100. It doesn't really matter. I tell stories as much to enrich and satisfy myself as I do to inform or entertain others.

It's something that started at a young age, though I didn't realize it then. And to an extent, my brother is partly to blame. I was a ravenous reader, and the sort who places herself in the story, experiencing it, not just observing it from the outside. When we were kids, my brother and I would create and enact scenes of ongoing stories (often Star Trek inspired spin offs, and for that, I blame my dad who basically had us hooked from birth). At one point, my brother even wrote a script that the three of us (dad, bro, and myself) read... dramatically... with distinct voices for each character. (Explains a little something about me, perhaps? ) I think that was the first time that I ever considered writing because I wanted to, not because I had a class assignment. And I did just that. In high school, I started writing stories (or typing them, as the case may be). I fell in love with writing. By nature, I am rather quiet and reserved. I tend to internalize emotions. But for some reason, I found that I could pour an immense amount of emotion into a page. Much like reading, I put much of myself into the story, even if the story itself was far different from my life. Often I wrote them for an audience of one (myself) or with the intention of only sharing them with a few friends. Occasionally I would co-opt my creative writing for a class.

Somewhere along the way, I found that I could even take pleasure in writing about someone else's work, in telling someone else's story, in connecting seemingly disparate findings. Finding the thread that connects or unravels a list of points is as much a part of telling a story as creating a new one. Even when the process is difficult, frustrating, maybe even painful (at least, mentally), there is something amazing and beautiful about turning dry, disconnected information into a lively, cohesive narrative.

Writing and science are where my passion lies. I am fortunate that these two often come together. If you took away science, I could subsist on writing. If you took away the writing and the creative process that goes with it, I would be hard-pressed to subsist on science alone. And I suspect that is something that will direct my career path in the years to come.