Harmony

“Alexa, turn on the bedroom.”

“Okay!” my trusty AI robotically replies as the entire room lights up in an orange glow, sparking all of my pent up creativity. Outside, the Texan cicadas are buzzing away, and together with the crickets make a symphony. This year, I’ve dedicated myself to exploring new things. Learning guitar? Sure. Practicing Python programming? Yep. But what about something different? Something I haven’t tried before? Let’s try making my own music.

Many say making electronic music is “easy,” but let me tell you that it is much easier to strum four chords on a guitar than trying to make something that actually sounds good. Yet this challenge to make so many different sounds fit together is what makes it fun, and the internal harmony of using what you’ve learned to accomplish something is satisfying beyond belief. This harmony is what I pursue every day of my life: taking completely different parts, fitting them perfectly together to make something bigger and better than before.

Harmony is far from just being about music. My entire school career has been understanding the different pieces of our world and stringing them together to understand something greater, just like a song. Let’s think of biology as a brand new track. Start with the beat, the foundation: understanding water and carbon’s properties (basic chemistry). Now maybe add the base: Macromolecules and organelles (cell biology). From there, we just keep layering: DNA, protein structure, reproduction. Now we’ve got something: cell communication, creating tissue, creating organs, soon we’ve got ourselves up to an organism. Now take this and go further: lifecycles, ecology, the entire biosphere. Harmony. During my experiences at the University of Texas, Southwestern, I was exposed first-hand to this connectivity. My peers and I were able to shadow a lab that was investigating the effects of a certain strain of Vibrio on human cells in response to an increasing amount of the strain in the ocean thanks to rising sea temperatures. To me, being in that lab was like singing a simple song with all of my biology knowledge: the perfect way to experience science.

Of course, while speaking of harmony, it would be criminal to not bring up one of the most important aspects of my life: Choir. And no, I’m not talking about the actual harmonies we make, I’m talking about the people. All 80 of us Varsity singers are completely different: jocks, nerds, actors, and engineers. No matter where we come from or how different our lives are, in choir, we are a family. But how? Well, we’re all divided into sections, essentially breaking choir into smaller, more human and intimate parts, and giving each person the opportunity to have his or her voice heard–not in singing–but sharing his or her own feedback and struggles as well. As Tenor section leader, I help connect and string together the perspectives and sounds of my section. This makes connecting all the parts into a single thought, a single voice, so important. This connection to each other, this harmony in thought, has been the reason for our nationally renowned and state-wide success.

There’s only one thing in my life which couldn’t be figured out, couldn’t be structured or harmonized: my father’s leukemia. Cancer has no song, has no harmony; it is the craziest most unpredictable thing someone can experience and can turn anyone’s life upside down. My parents did everything they could to help ease my worry, and make me understand, as best as possible, this disease. All I could come up with was a broken melody and a sad beat.

This is why I am pursuing medicine. I want to become a surgical oncologist and make as much sense of cancer as humanly possible, no matter what it takes. I’m prepared to learn, connect, and accomplish anything I can to finish this song, to find this harmony.