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My wedding was both the best and worst day of my life. Here's what I learned.

10 days before my wedding, my brother lost his fight with pediatric bone cancer.

It was my wedding day.

I stood outside the doors to the chapel. My heart was racing, and I felt my eyes fill up with tears.

I can’t do this.

Before I could turn and run, the doors flung open. I was caught off guard as 80 expectant faces turned to look at me. I scanned the crowd. I saw my family and friends. I saw my dad and stepfather waiting in front of the altar to give me away. But I was going to have to walk down the aisle alone, and that was not how it was supposed to be.

I don’t know how long I paused there. I felt like I couldn’t move.

Then my eyes found my future husband, Joe. And right next to him, I saw a single candle burning on a tall candelabra. Gulp. I looked back at Joe and decided that if I could make it down the aisle to him, I’d be OK.

I felt as if my knees might buckle, but somehow I began walking. It was surreal. I felt as if I were floating, but I eventually made it down the aisle.

Me and my husband-to-be on my wedding day. All photos from the author and used with permission.

18 months earlier, my 16-year-old brother was diagnosed with a rare pediatric bone cancer.

The diagnosis was grim. The prognosis was not good. He was quick to rally. He was going to be fine. He was going to live his life. He was still planning a future. He packed a lot of living in a short time.

10 days before my wedding, he lost his fight.

Now, I look back and I don’t know how my family and I made it through both a funeral and a wedding in such a short span of time, but we did. There would be no postponing of the wedding as I’d suggested. Every single member of my family told me in no uncertain terms that my brother would never want me to put it off. He always said he "didn’t have time for cancer." He didn’t let it stop him from doing the things he wanted to do, and he would be highly pissed if I let cancer stop my wedding.

So, even though we were still in a state of shock, we had a wedding. There were tributes to my brother throughout the wedding, including the single candle that stood where he was supposed to stand as a groomsman. We read a beautiful poem in his memory during the ceremony. We played his favorite song at the reception. And we danced. And we drank. And, inexplicably, we had fun.

15 years have passed since that day.

15 years and I’m still trying to figure out how to move through life without him. 15 years and I’m still learning about how this "after part" works.


A school picture of my brother.

I would gladly trade the things I’ve learned to have my brother back, but I learned a long time ago that bargaining doesn’t work. So usually, I choose to appreciate the lessons I’ve learned instead.

1. I’ve learned to cut people some extra slack.

You really don’t know what people are going through. You don’t know what they have endured. You don’t know what battles they may be fighting.

There were the times during my brother’s illness when I would find myself driving 15 mph in the left lane. I’d be lost somewhere between grief and exhaustion, and I would arrive home with no idea how I got there. There were times when I’d look up distractedly at the grocery store, only to realize that I’d been standing in the middle of the aisle, lost in thought, for 10 minutes.

I used to be the person who honked impatiently and threw dirty looks as I zoomed past a slow driver, but not anymore.

Now I know what it's like to really have a bad day, to be so lost in a world turned on its head that you’re completely unaware of your surroundings. I learned that we all have bad days. Some of us have really bad days. Most of us are just trying to make it to tomorrow.

2. I’ve learned that true compassion and grace are about suspending judgment.

Over and over, I saw that real compassion is giving people the benefit of the doubt: granting them access, assisting them when you don’t know them, being patient and kind even when you don’t know what they're actually going through.

If you have to know the behind the scenes? If you have to know their story in order to be kind? If your kindness is based on an assessment of their pain and if it is conditional? Then it’s not truly kindness; it’s just judgment.

I didn’t get this before. I wasn’t cruel, and I wasn’t mean-spirited, but I was impatient and I was easily irritated. That was before I realized the depths in which people can be trapped while still looking completely normal to the rest of the world.

3. I’ve learned that comfort sometimes comes from unexpected places.

There are people who had a huge impact on me, who helped me through difficult times, and they probably don’t even know the significance of their actions.

Sometimes, for me, it was the soft-spoken coworker who offered me a hug as I was leaving to meet my family at the hospital. He was shy and reserved, but he wrapped me in a big bear hug when I was overcome with emotion. I knew this small gesture was not easy for him to give, but his effort to offered me solace.

In another moment, that solace came from my brash, loud, jokester boss who let me take off as much time as I needed to be with my brother at the hospital. Another time, it was my friend from work who calmly assured me that I would feel joy again after I tearfully confided my fear and pain to her. And often, solace came from my husband’s brother and my sister-in-law, who drove 12 hours to attend my brother’s memorial service.

I learned that an act of kindness, no matter how small, is never wrong. Sometimes it’s the thing that can help someone put one foot in front of the other.

4. I’ve learned that I can still, even 15 years later, be blindsided by the cruel reality of it all.

Sometimes I’ll be sitting at my kid’s swim practice when a memory knocks the wind out of me. The next thing I know, I’m wiping away tears and hoping no one notices.

Sometimes I’ll be eating dinner at a restaurant and the waiter might look just like my brother. I’ll feel the loss and pain take over and overwhelm me. And in these moments, I’m always surprised at the cruel force of grief’s ability to blindside me.

Sometimes I'll see him when my kids do something especially mischievous, and my thoughts unwillingly flicker to images of my brother, to memories of the antics of a little boy long ago.

Me and my brother as young children.

Then, I start imagining what could have been: him egging them on, encouraging their exasperating behavior. And I can almost hear him laughing, enjoying every second of finding a way to torture me as an adult like he did as a little kid.

You can bottle yourself up and try to insulate yourself from it, but let me tell you: It’s not going away, so you might as well let it happen. You’ll feel it, you’ll hurt, but I’ve learned that you’ll also be OK. You will be OK.

5. I’ve learned that I’ll probably feel my brother’s presence forever.

I'll still see him in each of my children, in their personalities, in their senses of humor, which is what my brother was known for.

I'll still feel him when my family is together and my sister and my parents are laughing and we’re giving each other a hard time. I often feel the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I feel a warmth come over me, a warmth hard to describe because it’s unlike any sensation I’ve felt before.

And I hope I'll still feel him, forever, kicking me in the ass when I’m about to chicken out on doing something that scares me. I can almost hear what he would say to me in those situations: Don’t give up. You’re better than that.

I’ve learned to recognize these moments, when I feel him with me. They are bittersweet. They are welcome. And they tug at my heart because they will never be enough.

6. What I’ve realized most of all, after all of these years, is that there didn’t need to be a replacement for my brother.

When we knew, in those last weeks, that it would not be possible for him to walk me down the aisle, I contemplated other options. But in the end, I decided there was no understudy, and there would be no last minute stand-in. I couldn’t imagine replacing him in that role.

And as always, even though my brother wasn't physically there, he showed up. He kicked me in the ass a little and told me not to be scared. He reminded me that I didn’t have time to let my pain stand in the way of my wedding, my happiness.

Me and my husband walking down the aisle after our marriage ceremony.

In the end, my brother was still there with me on one of the best days of my life because he always has been.

From Your Site Articles
Science

A juice company dumped orange peels in a national park. Here's what it looks like now.

12,000 tons of food waste and 21 years later, this forest looks totally different.


In 1997, ecologists Daniel Janzen and Winnie Hallwachs approached an orange juice company in Costa Rica with an off-the-wall idea.

In exchange for donating a portion of unspoiled, forested land to the Área de Conservación Guanacaste — a nature preserve in the country's northwest — the park would allow the company to dump its discarded orange peels and pulp, free of charge, in a heavily grazed, largely deforested area nearby.

One year later, one thousand trucks poured into the national park, offloading over 12,000 metric tons of sticky, mealy, orange compost onto the worn-out plot.


The site was left untouched and largely unexamined for over a decade. A sign was placed to ensure future researchers could locate and study it.

16 years later, Janzen dispatched graduate student Timothy Treuer to look for the site where the food waste was dumped.

Treuer initially set out to locate the large placard that marked the plot — and failed.

The first deposit of orange peels in 1996.

Photo by Dan Janzen.

"It's a huge sign, bright yellow lettering. We should have been able to see it," Treuer says. After wandering around for half an hour with no luck, he consulted Janzen, who gave him more detailed instructions on how to find the plot.

When he returned a week later and confirmed he was in the right place, Treuer was floored. Compared to the adjacent barren former pastureland, the site of the food waste deposit was "like night and day."

The site of the orange peel deposit (L) and adjacent pastureland (R).

Photo by Leland Werden.

"It was just hard to believe that the only difference between the two areas was a bunch of orange peels. They look like completely different ecosystems," he explains.

The area was so thick with vegetation he still could not find the sign.

Treuer and a team of researchers from Princeton University studied the site over the course of the following three years.

The results, published in the journal "Restoration Ecology," highlight just how completely the discarded fruit parts assisted the area's turnaround.

The ecologists measured various qualities of the site against an area of former pastureland immediately across the access road used to dump the orange peels two decades prior. Compared to the adjacent plot, which was dominated by a single species of tree, the site of the orange peel deposit featured two dozen species of vegetation, most thriving.

Lab technician Erik Schilling explores the newly overgrown orange peel plot.

Photo by Tim Treuer.

In addition to greater biodiversity, richer soil, and a better-developed canopy, researchers discovered a tayra (a dog-sized weasel) and a giant fig tree three feet in diameter, on the plot.

"You could have had 20 people climbing in that tree at once and it would have supported the weight no problem," says Jon Choi, co-author of the paper, who conducted much of the soil analysis. "That thing was massive."

Recent evidence suggests that secondary tropical forests — those that grow after the original inhabitants are torn down — are essential to helping slow climate change.

In a 2016 study published in Nature, researchers found that such forests absorb and store atmospheric carbon at roughly 11 times the rate of old-growth forests.

Treuer believes better management of discarded produce — like orange peels — could be key to helping these forests regrow.

In many parts of the world, rates of deforestation are increasing dramatically, sapping local soil of much-needed nutrients and, with them, the ability of ecosystems to restore themselves.

Meanwhile, much of the world is awash in nutrient-rich food waste. In the United States, up to half of all produce in the United States is discarded. Most currently ends up in landfills.

The site after a deposit of orange peels in 1998.

Photo by Dan Janzen.

"We don't want companies to go out there will-nilly just dumping their waste all over the place, but if it's scientifically driven and restorationists are involved in addition to companies, this is something I think has really high potential," Treuer says.

The next step, he believes, is to examine whether other ecosystems — dry forests, cloud forests, tropical savannas — react the same way to similar deposits.

Two years after his initial survey, Treuer returned to once again try to locate the sign marking the site.

Since his first scouting mission in 2013, Treuer had visited the plot more than 15 times. Choi had visited more than 50. Neither had spotted the original sign.

In 2015, when Treuer, with the help of the paper's senior author, David Wilcove, and Princeton Professor Rob Pringle, finally found it under a thicket of vines, the scope of the area's transformation became truly clear.

The sign after clearing away the vines.

Photo by Tim Treuer.

"It's a big honking sign," Choi emphasizes.

19 years of waiting with crossed fingers had buried it, thanks to two scientists, a flash of inspiration, and the rind of an unassuming fruit.


This article originally appeared on 08.23.17

From Your Site Articles
Family

Quick-thinking mom finds her lost toddler in a Kmart thanks to TikTok hack

Every parent should learn this.

via Jess Martini / Tik Tok

There are few things as frightening to a parent than losing your child in a crowded place like a shopping mall, zoo, or stadium. The moment you realize your child is missing, it's impossible not to consider the terrifying idea they may have been kidnapped.

A woman in New Zealand recently lost her son in a Kmart but was able to locate him because of a potentially life-saving parenting hack she saw on TikTok a few months ago.

The woman was shopping at the retailer when she realized her two-year-old son Nathan was missing. She immediately told a friend to alert the staff to ensure he didn't leave through the store's front exit.


"Another friend searched the area he was last seen," the mom wrote in a Facebook post.

The mother began looking for him by rummaging through clothes racks and running through the aisles.

It was the "scariest 10 minutes of my life" she later wrote.

assets.rebelmouse.io


But then she remembered a parenting hack she saw on TikTok by blogger Jess Martini. "If your child goes missing, screw the stares and start calling out their description," the mother recalled.

"I'm missing a little boy, he's wearing a yellow shirt and has brown hair. He's two years old and his name is Nathan!" she called out to the rest of the store while reminding herself not to "break down" in tears.

"You need people to understand you loud and clear," she said.

The mother's calls immediately deputized everyone who heard them to begin looking for the child. It was like multiplying the search by a factor of 10. "I turned an aisle and heard 'He's here!'" she wrote. "I turned back the way I came and there he was. A man had walked past him after hearing me calling out."

She immediately thanked the man, realizing that if she hadn't called out he may have never known the child was missing. "Nate would have walked past him and he wouldn't have blinked," she said.

In November, parenting blogger Jess Martini posted a video sharing the best way for parents to locate a missing child. It's great advice because the knee-jerk response is usually to just call out their name or silently run around looking.

@jesmartini PSA that I feel can save kids and I’ve used- if your child goes missing in public #momsoftiktok #PSA #nojudgement #fyp #4up #besafe #parentsoftiktok ♬ original sound - Jess martini

"To all parents out there, if your child goes missing, do not search in silence or just call out their name,' Martini says in the video. "Shout out loud and clear. Say they're missing, give a description and repeat, repeat, repeat!"

"Everyone will be on alert, and if someone is trying to take off with your kid, it will decrease the chances of them getting away," she added.


The advice is a great reminder to make a mental note of what your child is wearing when you go out, so if they go missing, you can easily provide a description. It also proof that when a parent needs help, most people are more than willing to lend a hand.


This article originally appeared on 01.27.21

From Your Site Articles
life hacks
Pop Culture

Parents who grew up in the '70s and '80s remember the experiences that blow their kids' minds

Kids were tougher then for a reason.

via Wikimedia Commons

Island School Class, circa 1970s.

Parents, do you think your child would be able to survive if they were transported back to the '70s or '80s? Could they live at a time before the digital revolution put a huge chunk of our lives online?

These days, everyone has a phone in their pocket, but before then, if you were in public and needed to call someone, you used a pay phone. Can you remember the last time you stuck 50 cents into one and grabbed the grubby handset?

According to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, roughly 100,000 pay phones remain in the U.S., down from 2 million in 1999.

Do you think a 10-year-old kid would have any idea how to use a payphone in 2022? Would they be able to use a Thomas Guide map to find out how to get somewhere? If they stepped into a time warp and wound up in 1975, could they throw a Led Zeppelin album on the record player at a party?

Another big difference between now and life in the '70s and '80s has been public attitudes toward smoking cigarettes. In 1965, 42.4% of Americans smoked and now, it’s just 12.5%. This sea change in public opinion about smoking means there are fewer places where smoking is deemed acceptable.

But in the early '80s, you could smoke on a bus, on a plane, in a movie theater, in restaurants, in the classroom and even in hospitals. How would a child of today react if their third grade teacher lit up a heater in the middle of math class?

Dan Wuori, senior director of early learning at the Hunt Institute, tweeted that his high school had a smoking area “for the kids.” He then asked his followers to share “something you experienced as a kid that would blow your children’s minds.”


A lot of folks responded with stories of how ubiquitous smoking was when they were in school. While others explained that life was perilous for a kid, whether it was the school playground equipment or questionable car seats.

Here are a few responses that’ll show today’s kids just how crazy life used to be in the '70s and '80s.

First of all, let’s talk about smoking.

Want to call someone? Need to get picked up from baseball practice? You can’t text mom or dad, you’ll have to grab a quarter and use a pay phone.

People had little regard for their kids’ safety or health.

You could buy a soda in school.

Things were a lot different before the internet.

Remember pen pals?

A lot of people bemoan the fact that the children of today aren’t as tough as they were a few decades back. But that’s probably because the parents of today are better attuned to their kids’ needs so they don't have to cheat death to make it through the day.

But just imagine how easy parenting would be if all you had to do was throw your kids a bag of Doritos and a Coke for lunch and you never worried about strapping them into a car seat?


This article originally appeared on 06.08.22

From Your Site Articles
parenting
Joy

Lyft driver's hilarious menu of 10 different types of ride options is pure genius

All Uber and Lyft drivers should have a ride options menu.

Eric Alper/Facebook

Cameron the creative Lyft driver offers a variety of ride options to his passengers.

Have you ever ridden in an Uber or a Lyft and had the driver talk a lot when you felt like being quiet? Or not say a word when you tried to make conversation? Or play music you found annoying?

When you hop into a driver's car, it's a crapshoot what kind of ride you're going to have. But at least one Lyft driver is removing the mystery a bit by letting passengers choose.

Facebook user Eric Alper shared a post that showed a photo of a piece of paper stuck on the back of a car's headrest that read:

"Welcome to Cameron's car!!!"


"To ensure the best ride possible for you, I have prepared a menu of the various types of rides I offer. Just choose one (or don't, that's an option too) then sit back, relax and enjoy the ride. :)"

Then it listed the 10 ride options Cameron offers:

1. The Awkward Ride - You ignore this menu completely, then we will sit in silence for the remainder of the ride.

2. The Funny Ride - I tell you jokes or entertaining stories from my life.

3. The Silent Ride -

4. The Creepy Ride - I don't say anything but I keep staring at you in the rearview mirror.

5. The Karaoke Ride - We rock out to hits from the 80s, early 2000s or literally whatever you want.

6. The Bubbles Ride - We blow bubbles the whole time.

7. The Small Talk Ride - We talk about how crazy the weather's been lately and I ask if you caught the game last night.

8. The Therapy Ride - You vent to me about your problems and I listen.

9. The Drunk Ride - You throw up in my car.

10. The Cliche Ride - You ask me how long I've been driving for Lyft."

OK, the Bubbles Ride sounds fun, but also maybe a little dangerous. And the Drunk Ride is the main reason I've never wanted to be a Lyft or Uber driver. I may have unintentionally taken a both a Therapy Ride and a Creepy Ride before.

But seriously, the concept is fabulous. People often want something different in a ride depending on their mood, so the idea of having options to choose from is brilliant. The list also directly addresses the awkwardness that is often present when you're getting a ride from someone, so it makes a natural icebreaker and conversation starter—particularly helpful for folks who struggle with social anxiety.

People in the comments loved it.

"I'm sure this wasn't the intention but this is a great example of disability accommodations that everyone can enjoy," wrote one person. "Being able to choose how much energy I expend is so helpful."

"There should be a feature on both Uber and Lyft indicating what type of ride a rider wants or expects," wrote another. "I usually don't talk, but sometimes the driver keeps persisting and I feel awkward at times."

"It clears the air, takes the awkwardness out of it, and establishes expectations for the ride, on both sides," wrote another. "Great idea."


There are some more options I'd love to see added, though:

The Pep Talk Ride - You need encouragement? I'll give you everything I've got to pump you up.

The Tour Guide Ride - I share interesting details about places we pass and offer advice on cool things to do around the area.

The Life Story Ride - We estimate how long your ride will be, set a timer, and each of us shares our life story for half the ride. (No questions, unless the ride goes longer.)

The Deep Questions Ride - We skip the small talk and get right to the big stuff—meaning of life, existence of God, our place in the universe, etc.

The High School Debate Ride - We pick a controversy, flip a coin to decide who will take which side, and debate regardless of our own personal views.

The Pretend Persona Ride - We each make up totally fake names and personas and converse as them so we can chat without actually getting personal at all.

So many possibilities. What kind of ride would you want to take?


This article originally appeared on 04.21.22

From Your Site Articles
Education

It's not COVID, it’s culture: Teacher who has worked overseas shares the problem with U.S. kids

"The problem is cultural."

via LisaConselatore/TikTok and Hunter Johnson/Unsplash

Teacher Lisa Conselatore isn't holding back.

A recent study by the National Center for Education Statistics found that 87% of public schools say the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted students' socio-emotional development. Respondents have also said there has been a significant increase in student misconduct.

However, a teacher with 24 years of experience in the U.S. and abroad believes we are misplacing blame for this rise in misconduct. In a viral TikTok video with over 480,000 views, Lisa Conselatore claims that the big problem isn’t the pandemic but modern parenting.

“The problem is cultural," Conselatore says. "We have raised children to think that they are absolutely the most important person in any room. They are so special that whatever they want to do, or whatever they think, or whatever they say is the most important thing in that moment.”

@lisaconselatore

#tiredteacher #enough #raisingkids #timetolisten #supportteachers #culturetalk #culturecheck #teachersoftiktok #teachersontiktok #teaching2023belike

“I know your children are special to you. I know that my children are special to me,” she continues. “But none of them are the most special person ever in the room at any time. They're not. Nobody is because we live in a society and we all have to get along and we all have to respect one another and part of respecting one another is recognizing when you have a contribution to make and when you need to sit there and open your ears. … We don't have that down. We've missed it.”

In the video, Conselatore lays some pretty big blame on America’s parents, but she also offers some simple solutions to improve the situation.

“Teach them when to listen, taking a turn to speak. Speak when it's appropriate. When you have something to say and. It's your turn,” she says. “Let's reevaluate our family cultures, our community cultures, and our larger society cultures. Because of this is not working, not working.”


This article originally appeared on 11.7.23

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