Friday, July 29, 2011

It's been a hard transition! I feel like someone plunked me down in front of a mile-long scantron and slapped me with an exam that demanded:

Please acquire and/or integrate all the following components into an entirely new adult life. Doing so with poise is required for a passing grade.

  1. New car (manual transmission)
  2. New apartment (first time renter)
    1. broken ceiling fan
    2. self-move
    3. 100° weather
    4. no Internet
    5. furnishings needed: bed, desk chair
  3. New contact information (do not rattle off the old phone number while calling important people! And do not so much as stumble while scraping out the new one!)
    1. phone number
    2. email address
    3. permanent address
  4. New city. Locate:
    1. major stores
    2. churches, campuses
    3. parking
    4. peculiarities (e.g. streets with two or three names)

Thank goodness I had so much help. What a basket case I would be otherwise!

Monday, July 25, 2011

White Coat Ceremony

Oddly, I felt few emotions on the day I received the white coat of a medical student. Perhaps that's because it's not my first white coat: I had a white paper atrocity as a phlebotomy, a laughable smock in the de-molding project at the TAC library, and a long white lab thing for microbiology. (For the record, I was extremely reluctant to wear each of those. It felt like some kind of sin. I felt especially stupid when Viltis used to croon over me in that goofy, moldy smock.)

Or perhaps it's because my truck died that day (in the parking lot outside the student clinic while I was having fun getting a TB test and a Hep B titer) and I was in and out of rehearsal getting it towed.

Or perhaps it was because they gave me the wrong white coat—everyone else got the iconic, boxy cut, the average between a real white coat and a girl scout vest. But my coat fit my waist and went past my extended fingertips. It had a belt in the back and right-angled corners. It looked like a resident's coat. I exchanged it last week for the correct (lower status) cut.

I loved the keynote address, which was given by an older family practitioner. He reminded me of the OB/GYN at the Vita Institute. He emphasized that the physician is a servant, and I'm all about that. My professors have said several times: medicine is about patients, not doctors. This education is for patients, not us. I heartily agree.

And I did feel a small thrill as I looked down at my lap and saw my arms in white sleeves: not the paper-towel sleeves of a phlebotomist, the moldy sleeves of a librarian, or the thin gram-stained sleeves of a micro student. The thick, earnest sleeves of a future doctor.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

I like to cook!

So, since I have nothing to do in my new apartment between now and Orientation (!) I am cooking. I like to cook.

I baked a loaf of basic lean bread (it will take me a while to finish it!) and I also included a cute picture of a breakfast I was proud of. Bacon and eggs (fried the eggs, not microwave today, although the microwave will probably become my best friend later) and cereal with banana cubules. :D
It would make me sad if, in med school, I don't get to cook much. But, med school is more important than pleasure. So, for now (and on post-exam weekends) I will enjoy cooking.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

New apartment

I moved! The new apartment is HUGE. After looking at tiny houses for the past month, I feel like this is exorbitant and spendthrift. I keep having to remind myself that I chose this location for safety and quiet. (Definitely NOT for distance to school; I feel like I'm on the other side of town! Oh wait...I am.)

My roommate/suitemate/whatever (?) doesn't move in until next month, so I am living alone for a while. It was really lonely right after mom and my siblings left. I truly didn't know what to do with myself. I'd been looking forward to that moment for a long time, but when it came I was more confused than happy.

Monday, July 18, 2011

I'm moving!

The day has arrived--the day before the move to medical school. Tomorrow, this will be "my parents' house." Today, I have been scurrying since early this morning and I've been badgering my mother all day. Suddenly there is so much to do: have the car in order (oil change, tire rotation, fix a hubcap, state inspection, new insurance card...never mind the fact that I have had to learn to drive stick), there are the final details to pack, and a trip to Catholic Charities (for the things I'm not taking). I also had to change my move-in day and my appointment with the movers to accommodate my family's ability to drive the three hour trip tomorrow. We're leaving at 4:30am so that my brother (a college freshman at the same university as my school of medicine) can get to his orientation on time.

My starting cost is going to be so low! My mom has given me basically everything I could dream of needing. I thank God I'm not doing this alone.

Saturday, July 9, 2011

Tiny houses

SebastarosaHave you heard of the tiny house movement? I really like the idea of not having more space than you need. At left is my favorite tiny house: it's the Sebastarosa from Tumbleweed Tiny Houses. I want to build one close to my work site so that I can bike to work. :3 (This is my grand, probably-goofy dream. Whatever! It's fun.)

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Buried in forms

I have gotten two packets full of forms and information to fill out, and today I got an email with fifteen more documents (credentialing at hospitals!!) to sign and return. My signature is gonna be AWESOME by graduation.

I deal better with bureaucracy when I'm organized (e.g. if I have all the paperwork arranged or a list of all the passwords...) and not stressed. If I can remember this, I can survive the sea of paperwork that awaits!