It is not my birthday this week. Or next week. Or anytime soon, unlike the past four office DJs.
I’m not trying to be a “special snowflake” here or anything, but besides not being a September baby, I also represent another minority in the newsroom — I'm a STEM major.
While my fellow journalists chat about the cases they’re learning about in media law or the sources who won’t call them back for news writing class, I spout on about the wonders of the world of science — all the kinds of ways you can break bones, how you can engineer a fruit fly’s leg to grow out of its eyeball, and how the mitochondria really is the powerhouse of the cell (in grotesque detail).
It is not uncommon for my coworkers to abruptly get up and leave when I begin one of my science rants. What’s a girl to do?
When faced with such complete and utter isolation, I turn toward a pick me up. Every woman in STEM needs a bumpin’ playlist to pipette DNA fragments to. (That’s what scientists do, right?)
Oh, and to forget our disproportionately small representation in our prospective fields.
