"Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it." – Helen Keller
Mr. Lewin, my math teacher, told me after class that he’s been thinking about my story, and said it was remarkably inspirational. It flattered me, and I really thank him for what he said. He told me I should write about this and I told him I was considering it.
P.S. I did!
I also interviewed Mr. Lewin. Mr. Lewin is my math teacher. He’s the one that told me to write my story (see October 5, 2018).
He’s so nice to me. He told me that it was amazing that I was doing so well socially, academically, and physically. As a teacher, he’s seen other students struggle, but not with anything as life threatening as me. As a teacher, he’s also seen other students with great families, communities, education, and finances, yet they make bad decisions and end up falling to the bottom.
If you’re in the hospital, just know that you need to have hope. Hope is the one thing that’s guaranteed by yourself. When you survive your ordeal, you’ll become stronger as a person. That’s something to hope for.
A student spilled water onto his floor multiple times. The floor is carpet, so mold can grow on it. Mr. Lewin chastised that student, because if I get an infection from the mold, then that’s… bad.
Today was a Pink Dot Club meeting. We watched the videos submitted for the UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital (see November 25, 2018 for my video). We watched ‘This is my Story #1” first. It took the entire period.
The club president still hasn’t watched “This Is My Story #2”. That video was my transplant story. It’s the most important video because it supposed to give the patient’s hope.
After the Pink Dot Club meeting, I shared “This Is My Story #1 & #2” with Mr. Lewin, my math teacher. He’s really interested with my story.
Mr. Lewin watched my videos last night. Two times, in fact. He loved it and showed it to his wife.
His wife wants to have my video. She wants to share it with other people. She’s also a teacher, so she might share it with her students too.
This is a great opportunity to get my story out there!
Yesterday I edited “This Is My Story #2” to focus more toward other people than people in the hospital. At the end I added how to be an organ donor.
I shared this video with Mr. Lewin, Mr. Lewin’s wife, and the San Ramon students. A San Ramon student email tried to access my video, so I shared it with them.
Today I went to school and distributed my Pleasanton Weekly article. I showed it to four of my classmates, two of my teachers (including Mr. Lewin), and Amy McCarthy.
I received overwhelming support from my teachers and Amy. Amy told me, “They wouldn’t give just anyone an entire page.”
Kina, my classmate, saw in the article that I was releasing my cookbook. I didn’t tell her about my cookbook before, but she said, “Can I come?”
I thought I was going to the release alone, but now that Kina wants to come everything might change. Maybe I can invite other friends and they’ll also want to come?
Today I visited Mr. Lewin at his classroom after school. I wanted to check up — well, not check up. I shouldn’t say that. More like say “hello” and tell him I was doing fine.
He was excited to see me! And I was excited to see him.
I told him everything, well, everything except Tasty. I wanted to tell him later.
But I told him how I met Donor Network West, me speaking at Sonoma for Make-A-WIsh, and transplant camp. After I updated him about my summer, he said he was glad to see I was doing great.
Mr. Lewin told me I was glad I stopped by because he was thinking about me sporadically over the summer. Just yesterday, he was talking with someone about heart failure and he thought, “Oh wow, I know someone like him!”
I’m planning to see him a week later and tell him everything about Tasty. I can’t wait to see his reaction.
As promised last week (August 20, 2019), I met up with Mr. Lewin and told him everything about Tasty.
He said I’m a real go-getter. I try to grab every opportunity I have. Which is funny because I had to create my own opportunities before I grabbed them.
We talked a lot about Hollywood. How tiring it was to be an actor and the aspects of shooting on set. Looking back at Tasty, I’m not proud of my performance. Then again, I’m an advocate not an actor.
We also talked a lot about the future. What’s in store next after Tasty?
I do have a plan. The thing is, how will I carry it out? More to come. 😉
The one thing I’m certain about is that I want to be an organ donation advocate, not really a healthing eating advocate.
I dropped off some flyers of the Donor Network West walk at Mr. Lewin’s class after school. I said if he wants to, my mom would love to run the 5k/10k with him. I’m just going to walk.
Mr. Lewin told me he had a high school classmate who was now a news reporter, and she was interested in doing a story about me. Hmmm. Awesome!