i've been slowly trying to fill my head with the required reading and assorted literature over the past week. instead of doing what i usually do, which is either study my ass off at the medical school and burn out the last 24 or 48 hours before the exam and forget everything i've learned the 72 hours prior, or leisurely peruse through my notes at home while watching television and surfing the internet(s), only to panic in the last 24 hours and attempt to pull an all-nighter the night before the exam, and end up fighting off sleep while i'm actually taking the exam (truth: it's happened numerous times, including during USMLE Step One, embarrasingly enough), i've returned to my former place of employment down the street, the blue cafe on the corner, and isolated myself in a busy room with a pair of headphones and an ipod (who knew M.I.A. was such good study music?) and rampaged through hundreds of powerpoint slides and poorly excerpted photocopies of reqeuired texts that i never had the intention of purchasing.*
what's odd about being back at electric earth for the first time in who knows how many months is how much the atmosphere of the cafe and the midwest mid-west wash neighborhood has transformed. gone are the granola earth mothers and dreadlocked burnouts and the eccentric older adult characters that would sit for hours at a time with one cup of coffee and work on some incomprehensible project. the cafe's now filled with a whole new population of UNDERGRADUATES. it's like the west wash: the new class. you recognize the show, but it's just not as cool as you remembered it way back when.
i've become so used to hearing about "adult life" in medical school: everybody's married or getting married or getting engaged to be married or talking about it or has kids or wants kids or is pregnant or talking about moving here or there and beginning their real lives, and i am not necessarily an exception, although i continue to think of myself (proudly, i've noticed) as a somewhat socially immature outlier amongst my classmates. basically, i've noticed that i have a habit of looking at a person's left hand to see if they have a ring, and how big that rock is.
and that's fine, i suppose, since that's where my life is inevitably headed. but to return to the cafe the past couple of nights, i've found myself once again in the world of fake IDs, walking to class, not starting homework until 10:30 at night, not going to class until 11 in the morning, and living life without consequence. only this time, i'm an observer and not a participant.
kinda makes me feel all old and shit. time to have a warm glass of milk and go to bed.**
(*total djork-style sentence)
(**just kidding. i'm a lactard.)
this educational lesson brought to you by dr. j around 11:49 PM |
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I've noticed myself checking the left ring finger too:
Boobs - check
Face - check
dropped by 
The Metaphysician on 10 February, 2005 07:30 [*]
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I've noticed myself checking the left ring finger too:
Boobs - check
Face - check
Hips - check
Ringless Finger - check
I'm still trying to fight growing up, even while my future pulls me forward like gravity - slowly at first, but seeming to accelerate along the way. At one of my interviews (the one I was hung over for) I was asked to say something about myself. "I'm proud of being wierd" was my respomse...not quite sure how that answer went over.
dropped by The Metaphysician on 10 February, 2005 07:33 [*]
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Dude, just remember, that just because you aren't sporting the trappings of apparent adulthood, that doesn't remotely mean you are somehow behind or something, nor does it make you immature. In many ways I think its more mature to not rush into those things. I think some people rush waaayyy to quickly into forging and attaining the required signs of being a 'big boy'. I think its rather absurd. And I know you agree with me on this, but I love the fact that we,and our friends, aren't quite doing all of those things that quickly. Its not a race, though, ( and I find this to be more the case in the US then over here in Euroland), there is an odd pressure to race to some kind of finish line of respectability( which is a crock). I think manintaing that kind of youthfulness is essential to approaching life...and thats something that hopefully none of us would ever lose( there was actually an article in the new issue of ID expressing that exact same view and stressing how important it is)
And has the west wash area changed that much??? No more oddball mavericks running around the streets in boxers or throwing emo bombs at the local popular indie band??? Shame on those kids...
Dan, I think what you said in that interview is absoultely FANTASTIC!
and when I meet girls I usually look for a nice smile. You sickos with your married girl fetish...
dropped by ye ole vinegar soaked manacles of doom! on 10 February, 2005 09:39 [*]
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liz, i am truly sorry to hear about you and the fire hydrant. let me know if you want me to help you move out of its lovenest.
dropped by dr. j on 11 February, 2005 14:47 [*]
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Dude, it doesn't matter where you are in life, as long as you can hold your shit together you're as grown-up as the next person. I know people in their mid-to-late thirties who act like babies but have real adult lives...holding your shit together is way more important.
dropped by lol. ror. on 12 February, 2005 11:55 [*]
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drop some science: