bring it

(written August 27, 2007)

"Becoming a child again is what is impossible. That's what you have legitimate reason to be upset over. Childhood is the most valuable thing that's taken away from you in life, if you think about it."
- character "Baby" in Lullabies for Little Criminals by Heather O'Neill

So, it started. I have finished my first day of third year medicine…well not really, I finished the first 12 hours of orientation week. The day consisted of about ten different people telling us how, “we have reached an exciting stage of our medical training as we transition from classroom to clinical learning,” and “to be humble and hard-working” and “ to make sure we take care of ourselves, and sleep and talk to our loved ones etc.” I found myself being quite cynical about the whole thing, which in turn made me frustrated with myself for failing to be more easy-going. And then I started thinking about whether or not being “easy-going” was actually a good thing, or whether it was naïve or unrealistic or something less mature than cynical. Hmmmmm. In the end I vowed not to let myself enjoy cynicism too much more than whimsicality, but to enjoy both in moderation. Eventually I resigned myself to trying to pay more attention to lecture. I think I am just grumpy that my sweet, sweet vacation is over.

On my bus ride home I resolved to make a conscious plan about how I am going to approach this, “exciting, but harrowing year.” I toyed with making this the last post in which I whine – but I just don’t think that I am ready to make that kind of commitment before I have had a couple of call shifts. I am still working on my year-plan, but in the meantime, I will be more laid back about orientation week – I think I will have enough to think about in the coming months, I don’t need to worry my little head about hanging out in lecture one last time. Bring it on orientators.