My iPhone alarm spasms me out of bed. 10 minutes later, my eyes all rheumy, I wake up and scroll through my phone for 5 minutes. My notifications are flooded with math equations from peers distressed about next week’s calculus exam. All messages unanimously read: “Can you help me –?” In my brain that still did not have its morning coffee, I reply: “Of course!” Some might be annoyed. After all, who wants to do Taylor approximations in the morning, but I get up, brush my teeth, slide my clothes on, and rest on the couch to give my chubby cat some belly rubs as I respond to these puzzled texts, my favorite brain primers. I love helping people.

Minutes later, the school bus arrives. I hurry my siblings into the elevator, carrying my youngest brother’s bag that is literally twice his weight. Once aboard, my thumbs resume their work, articulating each word that digests the difficult concepts into manageable pieces.

At our last stop, my youngest brother asks for help carrying his bag up the stairs. Like any older brother would, I reply: “I got you.” During the school day, friends pop by before and after classes. We joke. We laugh. We chitchat. But we also say yes for help with homework and college prep. 

Though the questions might seem repetitive to others, the art of framing daunting concepts as digestible chunks is my favorite arts-and-crafts project. I love cutting and slicing the concepts into pieces that actually glue to other’s minds, even weeks after their dreaded test. Some of my teachers even call on this talent of mine, joking about how I’m perhaps more talented than they are.

Sooner or later, the bell rings, and everyone unanimously slings their bags on their shoulders and races to the bus gates, but I forgot something. I remember how my bus driver complained about my brothers’ playfulness during the bus pick-up time. And so I slither through the crowd to pick them up from their favorite hiding spots. My school’s massive, but I know where those mischievous ferrets like to lurk. Again, I lift my youngest brother’s ginormous bag.

Back home, my brothers and I have lunch together over chit chats before I launch myself into bed for a 1-hour nap. Of course, I wake up two hours later, only because I promised myself some caffeine before my dreaded homework. I knew that oxidative phosphorylation was waiting for me, with its redox reactions and reaction kinases. But coffee is my catnip: it’s what soothes me when I lock in on my homework. 

As I’m digesting this topic into mnemonics, my door creaks open, more like slams open. It’s my youngest brother with his English homework. “Can you help me with this problem?” I quickly divert to the homework cooking him and help him cook instead, digesting the concept easily enough for his understanding. After all, it’s not the homework I care about. It’s the learning. His learning. He later thanks me and slams the door closed 🙂.

As the sun begins to set and the oxidative phosphorylation beast is finally tethered to my notebook, I prepare for my two-hour Schoolhouse SAT Math tutoring session. I spend this half hour meticulously rehearsing my slides ahead of time, improving and gamifying every strategy I wrote down on the slides. After all, my course title was “Game the DSAT Math Section.” During this favorite two-hour session of mine, I employ active learning in my teaching strategy and ensure that learners feel comfortable asking questions, big or small. Even after we’re done, I often take an extra 20 minutes to answer the extra calls of help. Witnessing these aha moments really brightens my day.

If my schoolwork was light, I hit the gym right after for my favorite Push workout. Between sets, my phone dings: “Abdo, do you have any ideas which CS courses I should take?” I grin and text with my thumbs till failure. Sometimes errands follow—groceries for my mom, whom I would never deny a request for. It’s the least someone could do to their parents.

I return home after a long day as everyone starts switching lights off, but my gut tells me my cats are locked out of their room. I double check to see them right there, spreading their tempting furry cuteness all over the couch. I pet—and pet, and pet—in cuteness aggression until I unfortunately have to send them into their bedroom. This step is very important since I don’t want the couch to become their desperate litterbox! And as the final scene of my day-in-the-life, I launch myself into bed for the next cycle.

If it wasn’t clear already, helping others isn’t an unnecessary burden in my day. It’s a relief from my daily stressors and a wonderful opportunity to give back to others. In fact, after a quick Google search, this quote from Mahatma Gandhi has implicitly been my motto:

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” -Mahatama Gandhi

So, “Yes, I can help. Anytime, anywhere, anyhow.”