The media center specialist at PHS died early this morning after a two-year fight with cancer. Although she and I have been teaching together for 20 years, both starting at Par Hills HS two decades ago, I was never particularly close to her. Nor was she the type of beloved educator whose passing will cause a major rift in the school. What impressed me about her though was her fight to continue coming to school right until the next-to-last day of her life, never complaining or giving any indication to the school community that her cancer was so advanced that she was literally in the last days of her life. Such fight is truly inspiring, and her death makes me realize how foolish worrying about aging/health/bad classes really is. We all need a periodic reminder to forget about the bad and concentrate on all the good aspects of our lives, which are certainly plentiful in my case: my family, my overall comfortable life, my passionate interests, my delightful students. It is unfortunate that it often takes the death of another person to remind the rest of us to seize the moment and enjoy every day remaining to us.