this is what peak performance looks like

A woman’s hand holds a purple pen which is covered in purple glitter and has a large purple pom pom with bunny ears attached to the top. In the background rests a binder filled with paper and notes, titled, “Why Bioethics Needs a Disability Moral Psychology.”

Took important bioethics notes using this pen. Because I’m also an adult.

Oh! Oh! Call on me! Ethics Fellow and Chaplain with a degree in Art History.

Good news! This is true!

All the whimsy at my fellow's desk. We have paper chains, we have Albert the Alligator, we have tiny mice with grocery carts, we have building blocks, tiny tinsel trees, Paul Simon lyrics, and best of all - Grandparents.

Anyway - if your kids come home with pencil skirts and expense reports stuffed in their backpack. Beware. They may be experimenting with anti-establishment gateway drugs like theology and philosophy.

And yeah, we were dumb kids looking for an adrenaline rush. But we were also exploring the bounds of the contrivance. Questioning exactly how far the adults around us had bought into the perceived hierarchy and authority of corporation and institution.

There's a lot to unpack here (besides teenagers being idiots) things about imposter syndrome, surveillance/security, gender/equality, etc. But as a 30 yr old woman looking back - I am struck by the fact that we were already so aware of how contrived all of it was. We knew the emperor had no clothes.

Looking back - the amount of times we succeeded at attending meetings/were handed important documents/or simply made it into locked buildings...is astonishing. I'm also astonished by our stupidity, and the fact that we were never trespassed/got in trouble with any sort of real authority.

If they questioned your age - you immediately asserted that it was horrifically rude to question a woman's age, and that you would be going to HR. If they questioned why they hadn't seen you before - you had been sent from some unnamed executive level above wherever it was you currently were.

The goal was then to see how far you could get before someone questioned your presence/purpose. Bonus points were awarded if you demanded "reports" or other business-y sounding things from random persons. More points were awarded if you could get sat at some sort of meeting table.

In early high school two friends and I invented the game "Business Women" wherein we would dress in nice suits (usually from debate and mock trial sometimes Goodwill) go downtown, and enter large office buildings with as much authority and purpose as possible.

Find the cost of freedom
Buried in the ground
Mother Earth will swallow you
Lay your body down
Find the cost of freedom
Buried in the ground
Mother Earth will swallow you
Lay your body down
-CSN&Y

When I was about 12 or 13 I showed my grandmother a kpop music video, and she referred to them as "funky little guys." Now, as a grown woman of 30 years old, I am incapable of seeing a boyband of any kind without thinking, "What funky little guys."

I just woke up from a nap and somehow while I was asleep, everyone on the bus has figured out we are not going to the right place

I thought the bus post was an allegory.
But it's not.
But also...it is.

Stop scrolling and post two characters who bring you joy.

One of my favorite misheard lyric moments comes from @sarahhappily.bsky.social singing this song: "with four hundred children and a crop in the field." 😂

Wild North American sugarplums are boneless, but European sugarplums have tiny, razorlike skeletons. Inbreeding, I think.

Antepenultimate?

a woman with a veil on her face is saying let 's go girls . Alt: Shania Twain with a veil on her face is saying "Let's go girls ."

I just want you to know - I'll always share my glitter pens with you at a code.

That last sentence goes REAL hard

Shoutout to @rheumcat.bsky.social for her coverage. Much appreciated!

#ASBH2025 overlapping with the #ACR25 presentation on sJIA/Stills/HLH/MAS feels specifically inconvenient for me, a Pediatric Ethics Fellow with sJIA, PID, and a history of undifferentiated HLH/MAS. However, I fear that I may be the only person encountering this problem. 😂

Got to sit next to Prof. Goldberg in this talk.
1. It’s so cool as a student/fellow to meet people you admire on BlueSky and in Academia in real life.
2. Dr. Stramondo, Dr. Cupples, and Dr. Diaz all had insanely amazing presentations. Please go read these skeets.
#ASBH2025

Everyone who left their hotel room wearing their shirt inside out, also raise your hand. 🙋‍♀️

The Trump regime wants us to forget that the Kent State massacre happened — that pitting the National Guard against American citizens is a recipe for disaster.

Transitioning from the thousand yard stare back to being able to cry is a thing

There have been a lot of long hard nights at work lately. I've been feeling worn thin. Then last night I got told that a patient's mother remembered me - specifically because I give "the best hugs." Sometimes the little moments make the big ones survivable.

We will continue showing up. We will continue peacefully resisting. We will
will continue caring for each other. We will continue having empathy, compassion, and mercy for one another. We will continue to do the hard work, with our hands, bodies, and hearts. We keep loving anyway.