Episode 31: Senior Chapel Talks by Nathan Tran and Juliana Martinez ’19

Life is unpredictable. In his #SeniorChapelTalk, Nathan Tran described the period of his life when his father was hospitalized and the responsibility of caring for his younger brother fell to him, while his mother divided her time between the hospital and work. But through the difficulties and challenges, he found support and encouragement from another family–the TMI community. His coaches helped fill the gaps in his life as mentors, teachers, and parent figures; encouraging him to work harder and face his challenges. Family is more than just blood relatives, “it can be the people who carry you through difficult times…I hope that through the kindness of others, you too, will be able to find the family you need most when you least expect it.”

In her #SeniorChapelTalk, Juliana Martinez described the various ways in which she wastes her time…reading books, browsing through a library, absorbing mass amounts of information in a museum, and accumulating random facts of knowledge or useless pieces of information every chance she gets. But what exactly determines whether a piece of information is useful, when great discoveries in life often come from accidents and random observations? “Be curious about this weird and wonderful world we live in,” she said. Though she might describe many of her activities as “time wasted,” that doesn’t mean it’s time ill spent. Because “learning is never a waste of time.”