Conversely, I came to realize that being good at something is hardly a reason to avoid doing it.

The postdoc explained to me how to distinguish different sorts of particles on the basis of the amounts of energy they deposited in various sorts of detectors, spark chambers, calorimeters, what have you.

Travel provided many interesting experiences, but perhaps the most useful lesson I learned was that I really had no proficiency for learning the thousands of characters of the written Chinese language.

My fellow students there were very smart, but the really novel thing was that they actually seemed to put a lot of effort into their school work. By the end of my first semester there, I began to get into that habit as well.

Conversely, I came to realize that being good at something is hardly a reason to avoid doing it.

As it was, I realized choosing the study of Chinese literature as my life's work was probably a mistake.

Just before my final year of high school, my brother, sister and I moved with my mother to San Francisco.