The conference was a success.

A complete, unmitigated, no bones-about-it success.

Despite my poster looking a little lonely at setup (there were only two posters in my category!), it garnered a lot of interest, and people asked me about it all week.

The topic was really popular, and something that simply isn’t talked about in polite circles — I pushed at the appropriate past experience for a scientist looking to become a proposing principal investigator of a new flight mission, comparing what I perceived to be NASA’s current requirements and the collective experience of the community, as measured by the number of people who have held other flight mission positions in the past.

I’ve published three papers on the subject, but this was the first I’ve spoken about it in public, since I’ve been ill, but I have to say it was really well received.  Soon after I arrived at the poster on Tuesday, I was fully engaged in questions and discussions – not explaining my poster per se, because they’d already read it – but talking about policy and the future of small planetary missions.  It was incredible.  I really enjoyed it, and all the more so because I felt like I was part of the discussion again… a feeling you don’t get simply publishing papers and reviewing proposals from a distance.

It was an incredible day, and I loved every minute of it.

Sigh.

Walking into a conference for planetary science and new mission planning yesterday, I got in line to pick up my badge.  I hadn’t been there five minutes when I was greeted by an old colleague who, instead of shaking my hand, smiled and said, “Well, I see you’ve been busy!” and patted my stomach several times in quick succession.

I stared blankly at him, honestly not getting it (I’m mostly with friends these days).

So he did it again.

I smiled weakly, realizing that he thought I was pregnant because of my treatment-swollen belly (I’ve been on drugs and chemotherapy with nasty side effects this year, the least of which are a) weight gain and b) the inability to lose weight).  I do my best to camoflauge it with clothing, but since I have no breasts (double mastectomy in 2008 to save my life), it’s difficult, particularly when I’m swollen with lymphedema too.

The best I could come up with was a weak smile and the rejoinder, “No, that’s just cookies!” moving away so he couldn’t insist, and asking him quickly “How’s business?”

It was not the best of ways to start a conference.

Cars 2

Cars 2. Go.  You won’t be sorry.  We got to go to the preview last Saturday, thanks to Jessica, A Parent in Silver Spring, who gives away tickets to new movies, tells the community about free concerts at Strathmore, and generally keeps us all in the loop about fun activities for kids.  She writes about so many fun things to do — if  you’re local to D.C. or looking for what’s new and exciting in movies and activities, go check it out!

Cars 2 was AWESOME.  Yes, even for the parents. Trust me – if it’s your day to take the kids, take them to the movie when it opens this weekend (don’t worry, your kids know what date).  There’s an awesome James Bond-y feel to it, and it’s a lot of fun!

Caveat: There is a LOT more action in this sequel than the first, toddler-safe, Cars movie.  There are bad guys, and it may be a little intense at the beginning for kids under 4.  When in doubt, check the review on Common Sense Media, written by Sandie Chen.

Healthy enough to travel!

Last week I was in Oregon for my brother’s graduation.  I am SO PROUD of John for his work at Oregon Health and Science University School of Medicine and I am SO PROUD of his wife, Anna, for her work in architecture at the University of Oregon.  I wasn’t well enough to travel to their wedding last fall (but “attended” via ustream, thanks to my brother’s new brother-in-law!), but I put this on my calendar in January and have been working up to it all Spring.

I traveled.

I flew, with the kids and husband, to Oregon last week, and had amazing adventures.  We visited Monmouth Falls, the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (on $2 day! with an amazing exhibit on the technology behind the Chronicles of Narnia films!), we went to graduation and had Dungeness crab for lunch afterwards.  We drove by Powell’s Books, and I ducked inside for a five-minute grab of children’s books (which was awesome!).  We took family pictures and giggled and laughed as the photographer tried to get all eight of us to smile (eyes open!) at the same time.

We sat and talked around their tumbled glass firepit, and the children played Bocci ball with John until we all were exhausted.

The next day, we went to the beach, where we played in the sand and walked on the rocks and built tiny dams in the tidepools until the waves washed them away.  My little ones scrambled up a terribly high rock while the three of us, my husband, brother, and I stood below.  My brother was there for safety, he a certified river rescue guide in addition to a brand-new doctor of medicine, and I of course was there as the inwardly nervous outwardly cheering mom.  They made it to the top, and pumped their fists in the air with achievement, and my heart sang for them and the experience.  They tried something hard, and they accomplished it.

And that is what it is all about some days.  Pushing each other to try something hard, and celebrating the accomplishments.  We’ve been working on this with little things at home, things like perfecting age-appropriate behavior that has sometimes suffered as we get nervous or sad or scared, and eliminating thumbsucking and armsucking and physical comforts that have helped my little boys cope through the years, trying to replace those things with more age-appropriate coping mechanisms, and helping them see themselves as strong.

They are strong, you know.  They are so strong, and I am so proud of these little ones for all they’ve done and all they’ve been through, and I’m learning not to coddle them so much, for they are strong, and they can do this.

We all can do this.

I believe in them, and I believe in John and Anna as they set off to make a new life in another state, and I am learning to believe in myself, that I can spend this time LIVING not dying and clutching magical moments out of nowhere, making them for the children of course, but also for my husband and me, for we matter too, and I know that sounds ridiculous, unless maybe you’re a mother too, who wants everything for her kids and sometimes, somehow forgets to still want it for herself.

At a little store on the coast in Florence, Oregon, I discovered the legend of the Japanese floats.  For many years, these glass balls, used to float fishing nets, would wash up along the Oregon coast and come to rest in the sand, a thing of unexpected beauty for early risers to find on their morning walk along the beach.  They are rarely found now, but a few years ago, a local glassmaker began to reproduce them, and volunteers would sneak out to the beaches and hide them among the grass, or the tidepools, or the rocks.  They added beauty to the world.

There were lupines everywhere, and that reminded me of the lovely children’s story (Miss Rumphius, by Barbara Cooney) about the lupine lady, who wanted to travel and see far away places, to come home and live by the sea, and to do something to make the world more beautiful.  I read this to the children a lot when they were toddlers, sometimes reading it “to do something to make the world better,” or “to do something to make a difference.”  I should get it out and read it again, to myself, the soothing words sweeping over the quiet room, reassuring me that we need not all do everything ourselves.  Not all of us will be the greatest physicists in the world; in fact, only one will be.  But all of us, even those the world labels “terminal” and difficult and who some would rather not see, all of us can still make a difference.

I travel next week to the Type A Parent conference as the guest of Bloganthropy, an organization that recognizes women bloggers using social media to support a good cause.  The cause is cancer action, and I’m being recognized for encouraging you to join the Army of Women.  I’m so grateful for the recognition, because it brings more attention to the Army of Women and to the LympheDIVA/Crickett’s Answer to Cancer partnership providing free lymphedema sleeves for those who need them, but I am equally grateful for the push that it gives me to push beyond my limitations and work a little harder.

Next week, I travel. Again.

I can’t wait to see what I learn there!