Read this article later

by KELLI FONTENOT
Published Jan. 14, 2009 by The Current Sauce


Procrastination typically involves watching television or playing Rock Band instead of doing homework, but some NSU students find more productive things to do while they put off working on major assignments.

Sophomore health and human performance major Brittany Gunner said she thinks procrastination can be positive.

Gunner said she puts off writing papers until the last minute, though many teachers give due dates for their assignments on the syllabus during the first day of class.

"For me, it's a good thing, because when I'm pressured to do something, I do it. At the last minute, when the pressure's on, I'm good at it," Gunner said.

Some students seek the adrenaline rush associated with a final deadline.

To achieve that last-chance excitement, students occasionally work on projects for extracurricular organizations or academic requirements.

Taking Heart

by KELLI FONTENOT
Published in the July 2008 edition of Women In Business, a publication of The Dalles Chronicle

Taking Heart
Nina van Es, Celilo nurse practitioner

On weekends, Nina van Es retires to her house and 40 acres outside Lyle, Wash. A recording of soft Hawaiian guitar fills her living room as she binds a new memory to a page in her journal. She concentrates hard, layering pieces of tissue paper in her notebook, sometimes adding magazine clippings and pressed flowers from her yard. The fragile shapes and vibrant hues in Nina's collages reflect events she can't describe with words.

These tranquil moments help take the focus off the difficult experiences she sometimes deals with as the nurse practitioner of the Celilo Cancer Care Center.

"I do it if I want quiet time," Nina says. "I do it as something to keep my hands busy when I am processing stuff. Sometimes days here are hard."

The path of a cancer patient is a difficult one, but often, so is the path of the caregiver. When a patient has incurable cancer, doctors can only try to manage symptoms and make the patient as comfortable as possible.

"People pass on after you've treated them for years, or you've gone to funerals, and you have to have something that you can do to help yourself through that, because caregivers grieve. If you know somebody close for seven or eight years, you grieve when they're gone."

Still, Nina insists cancer is not a death sentence.

She argues instead that life is a death sentence.