Cold Comfort

At the height of my career as a scientist, and as an active alcoholic, I attended innumerable large gatherings and benefits at which hundreds of people milled around in a large room, sized each other up, and made connections to advance their careers. These events terrified me. I was prominent and successful in my career, but always felt like a big failure, one step away from humiliation and defeat. I dreaded these cocktail receptions because I was convinced that I’d come up short, that all I would discover was that everyone else was doing better work and gaining more fame than I. And these feelings persisted even if I was about to give the speech or win an award.