Dr. Patricia Hwang called me one Tuesday afternoon in early December, halfway through my winter break.
"I have a proposition for you," she said, already smiling. "But before I tell you, you have to sit down. This is important."
I had been working with Dr. Hwang remotely this past year on my book, translating my dissertation work into something more approachable, more marketable, for the general public. She had become an important advisor to me, not only professionally but personally. Dr. Hwang was the kind of woman who had managed to balance a successful professional life with a thriving personal life. An incredible achievement considering most women couldn't do both simultaneously without tremendous sacrifice to one of the two.
"I'm sitting down," I said, curling up on my couch. "I'm listening."
