Long time, no see, my dear readers! So much has happened since I last wrote to you from Copenhagen. Things have fallen back into place, into new formations, and I’m starting my senior year with kind of clarity that earlier in my Wellesley career I would never have expected. I’ll just run through the last few months of my life, I suppose.
Surprise #1: I’m a research trainee at Brigham and Women’s hospital in hormonal mechanisms of cardiovascular injury lab. I’m looking at a hormone involved in blood volume regulation called aldosterone, and how it controls its own production. Blood volume and blood vessel constriction are the two main components of blood pressure, so essentially the research I’m doing has potential drug target and personalized medicine implications for the millions of people worldwide dealing with high blood pressure (aka hypertension). I spent my summer working full time at the Brigham, going through a steep learning curve of intense scientific literature reading, making my assays work the last week by finally using super pure water, and learning the art of peeling off the capsules of adrenal glands.
Surprise #2: I’ve lived on my own. This summer, I lived by myself in Cambridgeport, my first summer spent living away from home. It was a solitary experience, but a learning one. I would like to humbly thank the Trader Joe’s pre-made food’s section for existing. I spent my time outside the lab treating Boston as if it was Europe- treating myself to adventures and all the things I wanted to do. I feel like I really know Boston now, in a way I never did just from occasional day trips in. Having lived in the suburbs my whole life, it was a shock to realize I could just hop on the T go to Revere beach whenever I wanted, and so I think I had a six-week beach visit streak. I went to the Harbor Islands with my first year room mates. I petted seventy sting rays at the aquarium. I caught a seven year old monstrous spider crab. I watched the sunset over the Charles nearly every night. It made me realize that I can do this adult thing once I graduate.
Just one of many spectacular Charles River sunsets
Surprise # 3: I’m doing a senior thesis for Wellesley. Yes, that’s one of the reasons I came to the Brigham in the first place, and it’s no small undertaking. I’m commuting into Boston three days a week to run my experiments (easily 15 hours total) and then eventually writing a 60 page research paper that will be reviewed by a committee of professors. It is an ambitious undertaking to say the least, especially trying to balance research with classes. But being in the lab is often a balancing (although exhausting) influence on my Wellesley life, and I’m hoping the experience will be rewarding as well as challenging.Our overall goal in the lab is to share our findings via publications, and it’s crazy to think I will likely be a published scientist within a couple months of undergraduate graduation. That’s a sentence I thought I would never write.
Surprise #4: I got a betta fish! Okay, maybe this is not as grand as my other undertakings but I am still very excited about it. I went full on nerd and bought a 5 gallon tank, which I carefully cycled for ideal ammonia and nitrate levels before his arrival. His name is Ditto, and he is blue, and he makes me very happy. He is a particularly energetic betta fish, fully enjoying his newfound space, and he swims around to greet me when I come home. I’m going to put him in the acknowledgements section of my thesis, and I’m only half joking with that one.
My fishy is so pretty! I am way to attached to this fish but he is SO nice to have around
Final surprise: I’m actually writing this from Maine. My Wellesley friends and I took one of our amazing roadtrips and are at an aunt’s lake house. I have had a beautiful day spent swimming in a sparkling lake, practicing Introduction and Rondo on my violin and discussing cultural definitions of emotion. Now we are preparing a beautiful dinner and so that is where I must leave you. More next week, and (it’s good to say this again)
Swimming from an island (I saw my first loon!)
Ever lovely yours,
Eleanor