I belong to the coolest adult Sunday school class ever. We pretty much take turns teaching it. Last Sunday my friend led a discussion on "The Last Lecture." I was so moved that I went straight to Barnes & Noble and bought the book.
As many of you know, Randy Pausch, a professor at Carnegie Mellon, wrote this book. Carnegie Mellon asks a professor each year to give "The Last Lecture." Between the time Randy was invited to give the lecture and he actually gave it, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and given only a few months to live.
Randy, a seriously handsome, super achieving, computer science professor with a beautiful wife and three small children, became an overnight sensation.
The book is, as you can imagine, extremely moving. I'll leave it to you to read it or just Google "Randy Pausch" if you want to know more. But I want to share one portion.
Randy was a nerdy "Star Trek" fan as a child and as an adult. I quote:
For ambitious young boys with a scientific bent, there could be no greater role model than James T. Kirk.
Mr. Spock was the smart one, Dr. McCoy had the medical knowledge, Scotty was the engineer - so what was Kirk's skill set? Leadership. He set the vision, the tone.
In the movie "The Wrath of Khan" we learned that Captain Kirk did not believe in the "no-win scenario."
A few years ago Randy Pausch met with William Shatner (who portrayed his idol, Captain Kirk) because Shatner was co-writing a book about how Star Trek foreshadowed today's technological advancements.
This year, after Shatner learned of Randy's diagnosis, he sent him a photo of himself as Kirk. On it he wrote. "I don't believe in the no-win scenario."
I don't either.
Randy Pausch died in July.
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