HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BODY BLOG!! You are one year
old this week. If you were a human, you would be graduating to the realm of
"toddler," you'd have tripled your birth weight, and you'd be
learning how to grasp objects. But since you're just a blog, we'll focus on the
lesser achievements you've made over the past twelve months.
A year ago, I didn't even know what a blog was.
I assumed they were merely outlets for people to spew their unadulterated
opinions across the web; kinda' like Fox News. But over a cup of coffee with a
genealogist friend of mine, I learned that blogs could be educational outlets
for writers, so I delved right in. I learned all I could about design and
content and then I started writing, and for every week since, I’ve tried to bring you interesting tidbits about
these amazing vessels we inhabit.
It was slow going at first. I had recently set
up a Facebook page to help market my books, but didn't really understand the
subtleties of social media. But once I caught on, so did the blog, and my readership
has improved by leaps and bounds.
But why write about the body, you ask. Well,
I've nursed a fascination with the human body my entire life, from its
underlying framework of bones and muscles to the intricacies of our internal
organs. I knew I would end up in some realm of the medical field. I had no idea
it would be as a firefighter/paramedic, nor that I would transition later on to
bioarchaeology. But you know what they say... life is a journey, and mine has
taken many a strange detour.
Writing about the human body holds endless
possibilities. The wonders and mysteries of the human form are limitless, and I
felt my unique perspective - as a paramedic, archaeologist, and anthropologist
- would provide numerous angles from which to analyze and contemplate.
And you, as readers, guide my subject matter. I
see what topics stimulate, which posts get shared the most and the farthest,
and I take that into consideration when planning my subjects. But I don't let these
things dictate. If I did, I'd end up writing about nothing but the lady parts,
since they seem to be THE hot topic among Google searches.
Birthdays are a time for reflection. When my
birthday rolls around (which they seem to do with ever-increasing frequency), I
can't help but stop and reflect on the year past and the year ahead. A
compulsive planner, I use my birthday to evaluate current life strategies - to
make adjustments to those that aren't producing and set new objectives for the
coming year. Yes, I approach life with a robotic precision (I would have made
an awesome drill sergeant), but it's this fanatical foresight that has enabled
me to achieve more than I ever imagined I could.
Is it genetic? Part of it, I'm sure, is written
in my DNA, for this compulsiveness spills over into other realms - I’m a raging germophobe and excruciatingly neat.
But part of it has developed through life experience. I wasn't always so driven. Everything changed with the death of my
mother.
She was only fifty-two when she died of
cancer. I was twenty-three, with my whole life ahead of me, but as I got older
and realized how quickly the years fly by and that, like her, I could go at an
early age, I entered into a subconscious game of beat-the-clock. Suddenly, I
was an adult, racing towards thirty, and although I had an awesome position on
one of the best fire departments in the state, it wasn't enough. I stayed in
school throughout my career with Orlando Fire Department, knocking out degrees
one by one in a race to achieve. And when I hit my ten-year mark and was vested
in my pension, I realized if I was ever going to try out another profession, I
had better get to it. I wasn’t
getting any younger.
On a whim, I applied and was accepted
into grad school at Florida State, which was fortunate, for when my career at
OFD took a sudden turn, I was prepared. I retired, packed up my
life, and headed to FSU, embarking on a whole new career, a whole new life.
I've been really fortunate. All of my
compulsive planning, my demented discipline, and tireless work ethic have paid off in big ways. I've achieved more than I ever dreamed I would when I was a young
firefighter riding backwards on an engine.
So as I reflect over the past year of writing
The Body Blog, the moral of my story is this: set goals and work hard. If a dorky
firefighter like me can go on to achieve a PhD, anything is possible.
I think my mom would be proud.
Thanks so much for reading,
and please keep sharing!
