by George Le Masurier | Jan 31, 2018
The independent analysis of the Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA, or Island Health) delivered by external consultants Ernst & Young two weeks ago concluded that an electronic health records system implemented at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital (NRGH) was “not properly planned or implemented.”
Consultants also found that the poorly functioning system, known as iHealth, was additionally challenged by “a general climate of distrust in the hospital.”
The Ernst & Young report reinforces the findings of another external analysis conducted by the Vector Group in early November that described the atmosphere at the Nanaimo hospital as “toxic,” an environment caused by management bullying its workers, retaliation and secrecy.
FURTHER READING: The Ernst & Young report
While those two analyses refer to NRGH specifically, north Island health care workers describe similar situations at the new Comox Valley and Campbell River hospitals.
After a two-month investigation involving multiple interviews with more than 30 different sources at both hospitals, Decafnation has found the facilities were not properly planned and that employees feel the concerns they raised during the process were ignored, and that decisions and information were kept secret. And they now fear retaliation for speaking out.
The purpose of Decafnation’s four-part series was to give these employees a voice in the hope that Island Health executives would start to listen to front-line workers and implement a genuine effort to mitigate the problems that can still be fixed.
And the public has a right to know that our communities didn’t get the hospitals we were promised.
FURTHER READING: The four-part series and other health care stories
Decafnation urges the B.C. Ministry of Health to conduct external studies at the two north Island hospitals similar those undertaken at Nanaimo, and to hold Island Health executives accountable.
The top executive of the region that includes the Nanaimo hospital no longer works for Island Health. Yet, all of the top executives involved in the planning of the two north Island hospitals remain in place.
FURTHER READING: Island Health exec sacked
And there’s more that needs to be done.
REVIEW ISLAND HEALTH — An external review should be done of Island Health itself. It’s clear that changes are needed at an organization where such mismanagement is allowed to occur.
RETURN TO LOCAL HOSPITAL DISTRICTS? — An analysis of Island Health might find that a restructuring of regional health authorities could have prevented these problems. The former B.C. Government merged the province’s 52 local hospital districts into five regional health authorities. The Vancouver Island Health Authority is further broken down into five geographic areas. Geo 1, which includes our two new hospitals is massive, extending from Courtenay to the whole north Island and portions of the mainland’s upper west coast.
The province used this same logic to break the large Comox Strathcona Regional District into two smaller jurisdictions, and it has improved local governance.
REVERSE THE P3 REQUIREMENT — The NDP government should reverse the trend toward building all major infrastructure projects in the province under public-private partnerships (P3). The new Cowichan Valley Hospital, which is now in the planning stages, should not be built as a public-private partnership.
Numerous studies have pointed out the dubious benefits of P3 facilities, some going so far as to say they are a bad deal for taxpayers.
FURTHER READING: P3’s double the cost of government borrowing; The hidden price of public-private partnerships
Many of the problems at the two north Island hospitals resulted from private companies pushing decisions during the planning process based on profitability, rather than what would best serve the community or health care workers.
PROPERLY FUND THE HOSPITALS — Planners badly misjudged the necessary capacity at both hospitals. As a result, both hospitals have been overcapacity since they opened and will never be adequate without further expansion. But the low morale among staff could be improved if Island Health properly staffed the hospitals based on reality.
Both north Island hospitals are incurring excessive overtime and most employees are stressed. That’s not a healthy or successful way to run any organization, public or private.
BUILD RESIDENTIAL BEDS ASAP — Island Health’s failure to assess the residential care requirement in the Comox Valley is epic. They don’t seem to know what to do. But those who work in the field of community Health Services know. The Comox Valley needs up to 200 new residential beds immediately.
It will take three years to get a new facility up and running. But with new funding right now, St. Joseph’s could reactivate its award-winning transitional care unit to accommodate the people who need that level of care but who are now taking up more expensive acute care beds at the Comox Valley Hospital. That would help to solve many issues surrounding overcapacity and understaffing.
COMMUNITY HEALTH SERVICES — Unpaid caregivers and those employed in home support programs need more funding. The Comox Valley needs more Adult Day Care programs and more respite beds.
At least a third of unpaid caregivers (usually family members) are in distress because the province isn’t supporting them with greater access to ADC programs and respite beds. They are burnt out, angry, and they deserve better for attending to their loved ones. Not to mention that unpaid caregivers save the province $3.5 billion per year.
SUPPORT ST. JOSEPH’S — The St. Joseph’s board of directors has an excellent vision to create a Dementia Village and campus of specific care for seniors on its former 17-acre hospital site. There should be no conflict between the Catholic-run facility and the Canadian Medical Assistance in Dying law, as 95 percent of patients currently in The Views (St. Joe’s residential care facility) suffer with dementia. And dementia patients don’t qualify for MAiD.
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Taking these actions will move health care in the Comox Valley and Campbell River in a positive direction, and diminish the human toll on workers and patients that bad planning has created.
Those responsible for planning the hospitals that fell short of their promises and the community’s expectations should be disciplined.
And the provincial government must reverse policies from former governments that have fostered these problems.
It’s too late (or too early) to renovate our new hospitals, but swiftly addressing these issues will make the best of our given situation and support dedicated health care workers who continue to act professionally and provide the best patient experiences possible.
by George Le Masurier | Dec 21, 2017
The decades-old, worldwide movement to ban the use of thin plastic bags has finally reached Vancouver Island — but not the Comox Valley.
From Uganda to St. John’s Newfoundland. And from Denmark to California, cities, states and entire countries have banned the distribution of the thin single-use polyethylene plastic bags.
And the trend is moving north on Vancouver Island. A Victoria bag ban goes into effect on July 1. Nanaimo has voted to ban the bags, and Parksville and Qualicum Beach are in the process.
But the topic has barely crossed the radar of elected officials in the Comox Valley.
What’s the problem?
One trillion lightweight plastic shopping bags are used worldwide every year, according to the Earth Policy Institute. That’s two million every minute.
Americans use about one of these bags per person per day. Canadians use one to two bags per week. In Denmark, where the world’s first plastic bag ban was implemented in 1993, Danes use only about four bags per person per year.
Based on a rough estimate of our current regional population (67,000), and if Comox Valley residents are typical Canadian consumers, we’re using and discarding somewhere between 9,000 and 19,000 plastic bags per day.
That’s a big problem. Most of these bags contain polyethylene and therefore do not biodegrade. They will last virtually forever.
And, unfortunately, fewer than 3 percent of the bags get recycled. The rest end up in landfills or fly away to wallpaper fences and trees and often will ultimately wash down rivers and streams into the ocean.
Among the common trash items found on beaches, the bags rank second, contributing significantly to the massive patch of garbage swirling together in the Pacific Ocean. When the plastic eventually breaks down into tiny bits, it’s consumed by marine life and then works it way back up the food chain to humans.
To address this issue, governments across Canada and around the world are curtailing the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags .
Comox Valley elected officials
It’s surprising that the Comox Valley, a region with such a strong environmental reputation, has not yet banned non-biodegradable bags. Especially because there are plenty of documented benefits and practically no downside to a ban.
But from a quick email survey of Comox Valley elected officials, it appears that only the City of Courtenay has ever discussed the topic of banning single-use plastic bags.
Courtenay Mayor Larry Jangula said, “Our council dealt with this issues several years ago and at that time choose to convince retail outlets to push for cloth shopping bags, which has been done.”
Councilor Bob Wells said he recalls that discussion and he subsequently supported the Comox Valley Chamber of Commerce’s successful initiative to encourage retailers and consumers to use reusable shopping bags.
Still, Wells said he could support a city bag ban.
In Comox, Mayor Paul Ives doesn’t favor a municipal ban, although Councilor Maureen Swift said “It sounds like a great idea.”
“It would be best to come from the retail sector rather than top down,” Ives said.
That sentiment was echoed by Cumberland council members, who feel it’s a non-issue in their village.
“Many of Cumberland’s vendors are already doing it (not offering plastic bags),” said Council Roger Kishi. “We don’t want to be ‘big’ government, so we don’t want to intervene where we don’t need to.”
Councilor Gwen Sproule agreed.
“Not sure why it would be discussed, because I can’t think which business gives out single-use bags,” she said. “Certainly not Seeds Organics supermarket.”
But Sproule added that possibly the convenience stores are using them, and that might warrant some discussion.
A Chamber effort in 2009
It’s somewhat surprising that the Comox Valley Chamber of Commerce has been the leader of a movement to eliminate single-use plastic shopping bags. It’s generally — and wrongly — assumed that businesses oppose banning the bags.
But Chamber Chief Executive Officer Diane Hawkins said there was a “terrific response from the business community … to our well-run marketing plan.”
Promotion poster from the 2009 Chamber initiative to reduce use of plastic shopping bags
Starting on February 13, 2009, more than 60 local businesses and agencies participated in distributing 75,000 reusable shopping bags to customers through businesses and local schools in an effort to reduce plastic bag use. There was an accompanying education campaign to explain why the bags are harmful and how people could get involved.
“We had terrific community engagement,” Hawkins said. “People still ask us if they can buy the chamber Eco-Bags. It was a wonderful project that embraced the entire Comox Valley.”
The chamber also lobbied their B.C. chamber colleagues to adopt a “Bagless BC policy.” But the initiative for a provincial bag ban didn’t get much traction.
As good as it was, the chamber’s program relied on each individual business to voluntarily stop using plastic bags. Many, perhaps most, locally-owned businesses still do not offer plastic bags.
But the biggest source of plastic bags in our environment have not complied. Many big box stores, convenience stores, grocery stores and others still offer them. And some of the worst bags come from specialty clothing store chains that give out large plastic bags with purchases.
Yet, Costco has proven that big volume retailers can thrive without offering any shopping bags whatsoever.
Meaghan Cursons, who was contracted to manage the chamber’s initiative, said the biggest problem is changing the behaviour of consumers.
“Until we change, in a significant way, how we as a culture consume, the bag issue won’t go away,” she said. “But removing the ones that don’t actually get recycled, float away in the wind, end up in the water and look like seaweed and sea life is a great start.”
Worldwide bag bans
Leaf Rapids, Man. was the first community in Canada to ban plastic bags in April 2007. Since then, hundreds of large and small Canadian municipalities have followed suit.
Toronto was the first major city in Canada to ban plastic bags effective on Jan. 1, 2013. A Montreal ban begins Jan. 1, 2018.
St. John’s Newfoundland voted in a ban on Nov. 15, despite council members pleading for a province-wide ban.
“Come on, Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, get this done for all of us,” said Councilor Debbie Hanlon to CBC News.
A high school student in Fort McMurray, Alberta, created a widely supported petition in 2008 that persuaded the City Council to adopt a ban in 2009.
So in the epicenter of the Canadian oil sands, fossil fuel industry workers carry reusable bags into their grocery stores. If it can happen there, surely it could happen in the Comox Valley.
Denmark was the first country to enact a nationwide ban, but many others have followed: Ireland, Italy, Iceland, Brazil, Bangladesh, Belgium and the list goes on.
It will surprise many that Africa has been a global leaders in the bag ban movement. The flimsy bags were a blight on the African landscape, and many people resorted to burning them, which contributed to the 23 percent of all African deaths linked to environmental factors.
Uganda, Somalia, Rwanda, Kenya, South Africa and Ethiopia all have total bans in place.
Why not have a Valley-wide ban?
We used to package fast food in Styrofoam boxes, because it was cheap and easy, or so we thought. Once consumers and businesses realized the true costs of the environmental cleanup, it was a painless transition back to paper containers.
No one misses Styrofoam, certainly not our city sewers or the mid-ocean garbage gyres.
There is simply no good reason to continue using the plastic bags in the Comox Valley when there are constructive alternatives available: reusable bags or five-cent paper bags.
Several elected officials told Decafnation that a Valley-wide ban would be too difficult to coordinate between municipalities and the regional district. But it’s been done successfully in other communities that encompass multiple jurisdictions.
And those who use the harmful plastic bags for garbage or picking up dog poop would just have to buy biodegradable versions.
As Meaghan Cursons said, our “culture has to shift its thinking in general about consumption, and waste.”
Besides, when did shoppers become entitled to free plastic bags? It’s a convenience we’ve come to expect, but which our planet can no longer afford.
Further reading: Stop being a bag lady (or bag guy), St. John’s wants province to ban bags, Which countries have banned plastic bags?, What’s so bad about plastic bags?
by Guest Writer | Dec 18, 2017
Courtenay tackles wood stoves
Will Comox, Cumberland, CVRD join the party?
By Rebecca Lennox
This resolution passed unanimously at yesterday at council. As I look back over the year, I am grateful that I had the honour of being your voice on council and I look forward to almost another year in that seat.
It is hard sometimes to know if I am doing the right thing, as there are so many huge issues facing us, but I do my best and that is all anyone can do in life.
Thank you to everyone who takes the time to be engaged in their community and to all of you who make the Comox Valley the wonderful place it is. Best wishes for 2018.
Rebecca Lennox is a member of the Courtenay City Council. She may be reached at rlennox@courtenay.ca
Resolution
It is well documented that poor Comox Valley air quality continues to be a major issue for residents of the City of Courtenay, not to mention the associated health concerns. The problem is most acute during the winter months.
Our provincial government has enacted more stringent regulations concerning wood burning appliances sold in B.C. as well as clearly identified the types of fuel that can be burned in those appliances, all in an effort to reduce pollution.
The City has worked in partnership with the Regional District to improve air quality with programs such as the Wood Stove Exchange Program as well as public education.
To date, 71 applications have been received for rebates to update wood appliances to the new code, but sadly only 4 of those applications are from Courtenay residents.
It is clear that the City needs to take further action, therefore I am proposing the following resolution:
“WHEREAS
1) Wood burning appliances are a popular means of home heating in the City of Courtenay;
2) The City of Courtenay is identified as one of the top ten BC communities for PM2.5 level pollution, that is fine particulate matter that can be inhaled deep into the lung;
3) Studies have proven that there is a direct correlation between PM2.5 pollution and serious health conditions, including asthma, bronchitis, lung and heart disease, not to mention the impact on other serious health conditions. Children and older adults are most at risk but no one is immune;
4) A recent study conducted by Health Canada not only here in the Courtenay/Comox area, but also Kamloops and Prince George has found a direct correlation between elevated levels of PM2.5 from wood burning to hospital admissions for heart attacks; and
5) According to the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment, advanced wood burning appliances compared to older, uncertified appliances can:
-reduce toxic emissions by as much as 55%,
-reduce PM2.5 emissions by as much as 70%
-increase energy efficiency by at least 70%
-use 30-50% less firewood;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that Council direct staff to implement the following measures to reduce City air pollution with the objective of protecting the health of our residents, including:
1) implementation of a two year program to bring all wood burning appliances within the City in compliance with current federal CSA and provincial certifications and emissions standards;
2) provide those residents who can demonstrate that upgrading their current wood burning appliance to a modern, cleaner and more efficient appliance would present an undue financial hardship with financial assistance in the form of an interest free loan from the City to enable them to update their appliance;
3) effective immediately, homes sold with wood burning appliances within the City of Courtenay will be required to confirm that the appliance conforms to the latest federal and provincial government certifications and emissions standards or replace the appliance with a compliant model;
4) create and implement municipal regulations and guidelines outlining the types of fuels allowed to be burned within the City of Courtenay; and
5) advocate with the Town of Comox, Village of Cumberland and the Comox Valley Regional District to adopt similar regulations.
by George Le Masurier | Dec 13, 2017
Photo: A view of the Campbell River estuary as it was in 1989, before restoration. Courtesy of Tim Ennis
The importance of the planned restoration of the Fields Sawmill site may well go beyond repairing a blight on the Comox Valley’s image. It’s likely to influence the prospects of a coast-wide approach to replacing multiple forest industry eyesores with ecological assets.
The remnants of early-20th century logging practices can be found all up and down Vancouver Island’s coastlines in the persona of abandoned sawmills, which were almost always located in estuaries.
These shuttered mills that once buzzed around the clock, cutting logs into usable lumber, have fallen victim to government policies that allow the export of raw logs, and to changing industry practices.
In the early 1900s, timber companies moved their logs by rail to larger rivers where they were dumped into the river, boomed, then towed by tugboats to sawmills located in estuaries. While booming adored our beaches with interesting collections of driftwood, it was inefficient and slow.
That practice still goes on in the Fraser River and in the Nanaimo and Ladysmith areas. But most Island logging has now moved toward truck-based transportation. It’s flexible, less expensive more reliable.
The change means sawmills no longer need to be located in intertidal environments. And that, in turn, means there’s an opportunity to restore those shorelines and estuaries to their natural habitat, and create functioning ecosystems for fish and other wildlife.
A view of the Campbell River estuary in 2016, after restoration
If Project Watershed — the nonprofit leading Field Sawmill project, called Kus-kus-sum to honor an ancient First Nations village across the river — succeeds in raising the $6.5 million it needs to purchase the property and restore it, other communities will be inspired to seize their own opportunities.
And there are plenty of them.
Closed sawmills
In Tahsis, there are concrete slabs where two former sawmills once operated on the estuary. They closed down in 2001 and 2003. The Gold River Bowater pulp mill, also located on a river, closed in 1999.
In Port Alberni, the Somass sawmill officially closed in August, but has been essentially shut down for a year. The APD mill there is down to just one shift of workers per day. Both are located on the Alberni inlet.
The Campbell River pulp mill sits empty on about a mile of prime shoreline.
While the loss of jobs devastated those small towns, they have reinvented themselves as destinations for tourism and sport fishing. Reclaiming the abandoned mill sites would help, not hinder, their economic prosperity.
Tim Ennis, senior project manager for the Kus-kus-sum project, believes there may be many opportunities on the B.C. coast to restore former sawmill sites located in estuaries, without negative impacts to the forest economy.
That’s because trucking has replaced marine-based transport as the preferred method of transporting logs and newer government regulations are more restrictive in estuarine environments. So the forest industry doesn’t rely on the use of estuaries as it did in the past.
Campbell River led the way
Project Watershed has viewed the restoration of three sawmill sites in the Campbell River estuary as a model for their Kus-kus-sum project.
Ennis managed the Campbell River project. At the time, he was the director of land stewardship for the B.C. region of the Nature Conservancy of Canada, which purchased the former Raven Lumber sawmill property as well as two smaller operations in the estuary.
He is now the senior project manager for Kus-kus-sum, as well as the executive director of the Comox Valley Land Trust, and brings his experience from much larger restoration projects.
“Compared to the Campbell River situation,” Ennis said. “The Field Sawmill site does not appear to be nearly as complex to restore and offers a huge potential benefit for the community.”
The projects are similar, he said, in that both are being led by nonprofit organizations. One of the Campbell River mills, known locally as Ocean Blue, closely resembled the Field Sawmill site, including a solid wall fronting the river.
But there are also critical differences.
The Campbell River City Council was committed to de-industrializing the river estuary. The city created an estuary management commission, which developed an estuary management plan. That plan included a conscious effort to relocate industrial operations away from the estuary.
So there was considerable political support in Campbell River, which was matched by the city’s financial contribution of approximately 25 percent of the land acquisition costs.
The City of Courtenay, on the other hand, was not the source of inspiration for restoring the Fields Sawmill site. Kus-kus-sum has been primarily driven by NGO and First Nations leadership.
And the City Council has not yet committed itself to any degree of financial support toward acquisition costs.
They have waived property taxes for two years while Project Watershed raises acquisition funds. But the eventual title will name the city as part owners of the property.
Nor has the Town of Comox or the Comox Valley Regional District made commitments, both of which stand to benefit as much as Courtenay from eliminating this eyesore on a main transportation corridor.
Fortunately, the K’omoks First Nations are committed and strong partners on the Kus-kus-sum project.
Not only are the K’omoks chief, council, band administration and Guardian Watchman department onside, nearly every K’omoks band member has signed a petition supporting the cause.
The Campbell River Indian Band was not as active.
If Kus-kus-sum succeeds, it will build on the restoration momentum from Campbell River, and set the stage for a much grander opportunity: to inspire and support the restoration of other abandoned sawmill sites throughout the B.C. coast.
How you can help
Kus-kus-sum needs community financial support in order to leverage the millions of dollars needed from granting organizations and the federal and provincial governments. Their website makes it easy to donate.
The Ocean Blue site in Campbell River before restoration
The Ocean Blue site after restoration
by George Le Masurier | Dec 7, 2017
PHOTO: Fraser Cain launched Universe Today in 1999. Photos courtesy of Robert Cain and Universe Today.
Fraser Cain was raised on Hornby Island, but his mind was always on another planet. Most of the time, Cain led the life of a normal teenager. He played video games and fooled around on the two-ferry, two-hour bus ride to school in Courtenay.
But whenever he could, Cain dreamed about the stars, the planets, the universe. He loved Star Trek. Read science fiction books. He watched NASA rocket launches on television.
He devoured information about space like a black hole sucking up everything within its immense gravitational grasp.
Today, Cain is recognized world-wide as an authority on space and astronomy. His website, Universe Today, is one of the biggest and most popular sources of news and information about space on the Internet.
The “Astronomy Cast,” a podcast with Fraser Cain and Dr. Pamela Gray
Universe Today had more than 48 million readers in 2016, and 140,000 people follow the website on a daily basis, and they do it religiously. Space buffs are serious about their interest.
He also hosts a weekly podcast on the website Astronomy Cast with renowned astronomer Dr. Pamela Gray, who runs CosmoQuest, a virtual research facility.
His company has published two books on skywatching, and he has an asteroid named after him.
And he does all of this from his home on the Puntledge River in Courtenay.
The early years
Cain refers to his father and mother as “big space nerds.” His dad has been a sci-fi fan since he was able to read.
“I grew up in Vancouver,” father Bob Cain said. “My brother and I built our first telescope before we were teenagers and spent many nights examining the sky.”
To encourage his fascination with outer space, Cain remembers his parents taking him outside to view the night sky, which is considerably darker than in metro Comox Valley, where they taught him about the constellations.
“In the summer, (we) would take sleeping bags out to Helliwell Park where we would watch meteor showers,” his father said.
And, of course, science fiction books and movies were the standard fare around his house. His mother, Josephine, took him to the first showing of the original Star Trek movie. He got his first serious telescope at age 14.
Two of Fraser’s astronomy columns in The Breezeway, circa 1989.
So it was natural that the family would gather around the TV on April 12, 1981 to watch the first space shuttle launch, something they continued to do for every subsequent shuttle mission.
When Cain arrived at G. P. Vanier High School in 1986, he starting writing astronomy columns for the now-defunct student newspaper, The Breezeway. He recalls they were quite well read.
Educator Brent Reid, who taught journalism and oversaw production of the Breezeway, remembers Cain as “a real go-getter.” He graduated in 1989.
Developing his popular website
Turning this passion for space and astronomy into a career didn’t really begin until after Cain enrolled at the University of British Columbia to study engineering.
Well, after he dropped out, to be precise.
Cain left UBC to write books for role-playing games, and co-founded a company called Absolute Software, which has since gone public on the Toronto Stock Exchange. At age 19, he helped invent software that enabled people locate and recover stolen computers, which you can still purchase at any Apple store.
Cain then joined a web design company, Communicate.com, where he helped clients design and construct their websites.
While there he hired a young entrepreneur named Stewart Butterfield, who went on to found Flickr.
Cain calls that, “one of my better hires.”
But Cain didn’t have any experience running a website, so he decided to start one of his own in order to better understand his client’s’ issues and to learn how to help them.
Fraser at age 14 with his new telescope and the astronomy club on Hornby Island.
He briefly considered a website focused on gaming, but of course he settled on space and astronomy. And that’s when he learned what he wanted to do with his life.
Universe Today was launched in 1999 and became so successful that Cain was able to quit his day job in 2003 and make space journalism his full-time career.
Cain has succeeded in a crowded field because he’s one of the few space journalists who do it well. He focuses on stories “way off the beaten path,” the topics that other space journalists aren’t covering.
Cain has written many of the 15,000 articles in the Universe Today archive, but the website also publishes the work of more than a dozen full-time and part-time other space journalists.
His senior editor lives in the U.S. His video editor lives in Prague.
Back to the Comox Valley
“It doesn’t matter where I work from,” Cain said. “During the course of the day, I talk to people all over the planet, some in space.”
Cain still travels to astronomy conferences, but he prefers to work from home, where he can help raise his two children.
He’s completed his university computer science degree now, and found the time to start up a new software company, Keyword Strategy.
The name, Fraser Cain, has become a personal brand within the universe of space journalism over the last 10 years. His name and face are now widely recognized.
But the Hornby Island boy hasn’t forgotten his roots. Not long ago, he took his sci-fi-loving dad to see the second last space shuttle launch at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
In a personal article on social media, Cain wrote, “I hate to sound trite, but I’m a living example that you can succeed if you follow your dreams. You know that stuff you loved as a kid, but then decided to grow up and get a real job? That can turn into a real job, if you’re willing to believe in yourself and put in the work.”
