Two Weddings and a Conference

As Patty Smith, the mother poet of punk, says: Sometimes you have to move a little to find a new noise.

2025 was a year of figuring out a new noise -- of adjusting to realities of increased immunosuppression (other than renal toxicity).

A virus, a bacteria, and a fungus walked into a bar. The start of a bad joke where the punch line and venue were my beloved wild lungs. My breath seemed to be knocked out of my body, and I was catapulted to memories of a long time ago in a hospital in land far away [Alabama]. I tried to remember how to deal with this noise.

One night, as I stood at my window in the hospital, I realized: I can't relive that old noise; I can only find a new one. I needed a new rhythm to get myself home. So, as is custom, I walked. I walked to rediscover the noises I love; of my home and community -- not those of a land far away.

And the new noise became evident: the slow and steady rhythm of a slog up a hill. A steady cadence: breathing, pedaling, and most importantly, focusing on the year ahead. On regaining my breath. On defining a new noise.

Then, January rolled in, and the year began. I felt a shift in my noise. I moved to embrace it. It was familar but distant, undiscernable. I kept my cadence, my focus, my resolve.

Before I knew it, April was here and the noise got louder at two weddings and conference (about lung transplant).

The old noises from the distance erupted remixed into new a new sound - a new rhthym with chosen family. We have grown up and remember moments of the past. But, we focus on the moment and fiercely dance the night away. We are entering a new era with a new noise - and we are entering it together. In the mornings we seek a better future, knowing we have the support of each other; knowing that because of each other, we are each braver than we know and stronger than we think.

Then, last week, as I listened to Lung Transplant: Past, Present, and Future in Toronto, I was proud to be someone in the field -- with knowledge of the past, acting firmly in the present recruiting a trial for a therapy that offers hope for the future. Creating a new noise for patients: a fierce hope for a stronger, longer future to prevent chronic lung allograft dysfunction (CLAD) progression.

On the train to the airport, I thought about one of my personal mantras: always try. In marriages / partnerships / familyships / friendships, you always have to try. In research <really the whole point of research>, you always have to try. In pharma, you always have to try <with safety in mind>.

In life, as in love, you always have to try. Even, and especially, if that noise of trying feels different than before and you have to move to make a new noise. What makes it amazing is that we are all here together, trying. Choosing to dance with each other every day, no matter what the future holds.

Thank you for dancing with me: no matter the day; no matter the noise.

You all make this wild life a dance I'm grateful to be a part of.

Cheers to the year ahead. Cheers to always making wild noise wherever we find ourselves and always when we are together. Love always, carolyn