Life under the quill

Happy Bastille Day!

I celebrated by throwing myself in an ivory tower and getting jabbed by pointy sticks!

Okay, so I was merely returning to academia and I got poked for a TB test. I still think it counts... and is somehow backwards. Oh well, in a few years I'll be able to celebrate my freedom again!

I now have a white coat. Oh, it's two sizes too big, but I do have it. We all lined up in Symphony Hall amidst crowds of parents, said our oath and got our coats. Here are a few moments while it's fresh...

Severance Hall is lovely, lovelier in fact than Boston's (which, like all of Boston, has a lived-in look to it). It has shining inlay, pale as mother-of-pearl or mithril. However it's surprisingly small, only 1000 to 1500 seats which frankly is smaller than my high school auditorium. Yet this is the largest indoor space on campus.

They have the students rise and be applauded for their hard work. They have the parents rise and be applauded for their support. And I can't help but think most of these kids just went through this a month ago. Isn't this an oath of office? Isn't this like receiving your fatigues? This isn't supposed to be self-congratulatory but rather a rite of passage about obligation and responsibilities. When the President swears in, you don't congratulate him and his family on a well-run campaign, you make him swear to uphold the Constitution and listen to the will of the people. I don't need a pat on the back.

The coat is giant. They specifically asked for our measurements and yet all of the women's coats are one to two sizes too big. They also button according to the way men's shirts button -- a little disconcerting. All the women in the class now look like 8yr olds trying on their father's coat. I look childish, not professional.

Afterwards we depart in a swirl of fanfare (there was, in fact, a brass quartet.) We go back into the foyer and, as others are taking photos with their family, I swing by the delicious food. I leave a space for the waitress, about to set down an incredibly heavy platter of grilled veggies, but in swirls a doctor to congratulate another student. They stand and chatter and meanwhile I can almost feel the waitress's biceps ache. Does no one see her?

This was and continues to be a personal journey for me. I don't need the trumpet fanfare. I don't need congratulations on managing the byzantine bureaucracy of the application process. Instead, I plan to quietly and without too much complaint shoulder the burden of learning as much as I can so as to serve my future patients faithfully and with respect. Offer me congratulations in seven years. Till then, I have work to do.

Yesterday was an excellent day for meeting people. The karma started with being asked out by the guy next to me in the DMV line. (Seriously?!) I did not pursue that angle! However, later I met up with a friend of a friend who is getting a PhD in physics at Case. He also happens to be a gamer and a bicyclist -- check and check! Then the two newbies in my house joined S at a party of the international folks. Turns out the international students have regular meetups and thus you get an interesting mix of physics, engineering, and medical students from everywhere between Ireland and Iran. On stepping up to the question "does anyone know bachata?" I discovered an excellent salsa dancer/ biomedical engineer who happens to know all the salsa places in town -- check!

Okay, I think I just covered contacts in several of my chosen hobbies. So far, so good!

Tonight was not a night for med school. It was a night for finding my homies, the geeks and nerds and coders and teachers and scientists out there. Tonight was a Jonathan Coulton concert. I was a little worried about showing up alone, but I knew I was in the right place when I saw the demographic -- a guy behind me was wearing a Miskatonic U t-shirt. I had 20 minutes before the show, so I got to chatting with the four folks behind me. They were, to a T, just like my friends through high school and college, just 8-10 years younger. They were newly minted teachers and writers and coders, happily out of college but still enjoying the joys of cameraderie minted during those times.

Coulton (and his opening band, Paul and Stormy) were marvellous as expected. Through the wonders of the internet, I'd been exposed to at least half the songs, but it was especially fun to join in and howl "All we wanna do is eat your brains!"

So you see, there are geeks hereabouts. The med students are a little bit more of the work hard/drink hard types, but I'm sure I'll sift through them soon enough. I've already found the girl in my class who sang with the Cleveland Symphony chorus. I guess I just have good chorus-dar. And tomorrow I hang out with a physics grad student friend of a friend. I will find my peeps. It just takes a little bit of selectivity!

Well, today was my first day of school. I biked in (a comfortable 15 minutes downhill) in time to enjoy a half hour of pastries and coffee before we started. I can't even count how many introductions I had, but it was so many that all the administrators began to blend together into a mass. You see, today was orientation day, not the beginning of classes which will be Monday. Nonetheless, we did several useful things: learned about how curriculum and testing works, learned about our societies (kind of like Hogwarts), did a practice case study and saw our first patient. Yes, this was day One.

When I say "saw a patient" what do I mean? Well, this kind elderly fellow came in front of our class and let himself be interviewed by one of the upperclassmen. They later opened up the questions to the class and we could ask anything we liked. Anything we liked about panhypopituitarism, that is. It was, I must say, all rather fascinating. I think I'm going to like this.

Another plus of the day was my society. They split us (like Hogwarts) into four societies. Mine happens to have a deep forest green as its color and a dragon as its mascot, so naturally, ours is the best. Our Dean/Advisor/Mentor also happens to be an internist, an MPH, and a woman, which all naturally makes me inclined to see a certain commonality. Add to that she's eloquent and down-to-earth and you have a winning combination. I think I'm going to like this.

So today was merely a beginning. I'm quite sure they won't feed us three times a day in the future. I also already have homework for the first day of class, which just goes to show the pace I should get used to in the next few weeks. I do wish I had a little more time to, say, buy a desk, switch my driver's license, unpack, do laundry, and all those sundry other things that must now get done in the tween-times. Nonetheless, it is a lovely start to what will surely be an interesting four years.

Made it to Cleveland, though over two days instead of one. The cats are angry but the place is beautiful and we've got all day to move. Viva la Cleveland!

Well, it's finally locked and loaded
... my shipping crate, that is.

With a team of amazing movers, the ever gracious D, the amazing medyani, the lovely buxom_bey, the loquacious D, and Mr. Cavalry himself, zsquirrelboy, we managed to load all of my belongings into the crate in about an hour and a half. Oh, there was the disaster of the dresser -- I didn't know they even made drawer sliders with ball bearings and grease instead of wheels -- and it took me another hour this morning to get the fiddly bits (a lamp, a rainstick, a cat fountain), but as of this moment, the crate is gone and my house is left a little emptier.

This morning I arrived at work a little late and zombielike. What I forget is how exhausting moving is. Not the lifting part -- that's plenty exhausting by itself -- but the mental exhaustion. As you pack, you pack the most ordered things first (books), then easy things (clothes), then trickier bits (kitchen stuff) and finally end up with a pile of fiddly doo-dads. What do I do with my jewelry boxes, my grandmother's crystal vase, and my naiad lamp? And even worse, what do I do with the piles of leftover bits that don't even HAVE a place (a ruler, the instructions to my camera, my stuffed monkey Mojo)? The process of moving is an exercise in entropy. You remove all the order until all that is left is disorder, and this disorder persists seemingly endlessly through box after box until you have four boxes of stuff labeled simply "stuff" which you have to unpack with curiosity and a little fear later.

My room still looks a bit of a disaster, but it's an empty disaster. There's trash and dust and boxes to go to Goodwill and furniture to sell and the stuff I'm planning to take with me. This I can deal with for the next three days. But in the meantime, my energy can slowly approach calm again and one of these days my brain will be at peace enough to get a full night's sleep. Mmmm sleeeeep.

Oh, I trust Evite about as far as I can throw a fork, but even more than that, I don't trust my brain just now to remember a single darn thing. So for that reason, I'm just gonna go ahead and post here:

Party, my place
This Thursday July 3rd, 7pm to ??

Come and help fill my newly emptied house! If you didn't hear about it before now, please don't be offended. My brain has been full of packing algorithms and todo lists and is overflowing. Just come on by and wish me "bon voyage"!

Yesterday, after a full weekend of packing (exhausting by itself!), I joined the lovely E, M, and K for an evening in Spanish. Oh, it'd been a year and a half since our last spanish language meeting, and I actually haven't even tried to speak it since then, but I was happily surprised at what came back.

+ I did not lapse into pseudo Spanish ala "yo hablo strange-o espanolo"
- I forgot just about every ending except first and third person singular
+ I understood a lot, even recognizing the subjunctive when it was used
- I pretty much lost all my verbs, including things like "to start" and "to find"
+ Despite all this, I managed to speak a couple of times and tell halting and flawed but intelligible stories. (I managed to explain the concept of a "bear number"! El numero oso!)

Overall, I felt like it was a wonderful refresher to my brain. All concerned were very gracious about including me, making sure I understood, and letting me take my time explaining before jumping in to help. If I have time, I'd love to audit a spanish course at Case. I know there are medical spanish courses, but I'd want a good basic first year course to solidify my foundations. And on top of it all, I got to enjoy a wonderful dinner of Camarones y Pulpo. That's right, shrimp and octopus. Yum!

Yesterday was one of those great days, despite the bad start.

I woke up yesterday at 5:30, set to run off to the airport. I had a plane to catch for a business meeting in DC. I got there in plenty of time, but they'd canceled my flight (an hour before it was supposed to take off). So with little time to spare they switch me to another airline... where I had to go through special security. "Guess you're getting a free massage today," says the TSA man when he saw my marked-up boarding pass. However, when all was said and done, I made it to the meeting with 15 minutes to spare.

The meeting went great. Kickoff meetings are always fun as everyone is hopeful and happy at the start of a project. Then there was a flight back, a training ride for my kitties (to get them used to the car), and a race. I ran the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge 5k. It was hot and muggy, but it was fun to be out there with my coworkers and remind myself that yes, I really can run 3 miles.

I came home and hung out with my roommates and the indomitable ukelele. We stood out on the porch and watched Somerville's 4th of July fireworks. A lovely display. Glad to see that parking ticket money spent on something useful! It was late but I figured I'd box up a few more books just to feel productive. I think I'm within one box for my main bookshelves. So close! Then it was over to A's for some amazing mind-blowing cookies. A lovely way to end the day.

I can't think of a better day to feel accomplished: jet-setting business girl by day, racer by night. Plus there were thousands of cheering fans on the run and fireworks to end the day! Who could ask for anything more?

Ten days left in which to...

Fly to DC for a business meeting
Finish one contract and design a new one
Run a race
Pack all my belongings
Sell furniture
Hang with my beau and his folks who are in town
Convince my cats that my car is a cozy place to travel
Do "homework" for med school
Attend a spanish night
Visit with friends
Throw a party
Celebrate the 4th!

Whew!

I started in on my closet today. My closet is enormous and amounts to storage for all the boxes I moved that contain "stuff". Stuff like old phone bills from six years ago, belts two sizes too small, and dried up cans of saddle butter. But one box also contained a shoebox of letters, and in that shoebox was a set of letters tied together with string: all the letters I received while I was living in Germany in 1993.

I have letters from my brother, procrastinating on his electromagnetism grading to read the Illuminatus Trilogy. I have letters from my mother, listening with concern to every shade of my homesickness. I have letters from S who wrote so regularly and made that mix tape. I have letters from that Polish count with the flowers still pressed between the pages, now yellowed and brittle. I have pages upon pages upon pages upon pages. It is a window into another world.

I have my journal from that time. I keep all my journals, but they are all in my voice. It was marvellous to see what was said, those pages that I read over and over under my duvet. There is so much that I love in our current world of instant communication, but I do miss the rustle of pages turned, the slant of handwriting that betrays ones mood, the greetings, the closings, the meanderings of thought that carry so much personality. No other time in my life is so well documented, and if it had to be one year, that's certainly an interesting time to remember.

So THAT's the mystery gig I turned down to go to the Red Sox game tonight which I never managed to get tickets to. My chorus sang backup to Amanda Palmer on one of her songs last night. Of all the things for me to miss!

Damn.

Yes, it's Race Day once again! This was the 4.2 mi run along the Charles that happens monthly. Today was a fair bit warmer than last month, so I lost a minute and finished in about 43:00. (The official time will come out tomorrow.) Given that it was warmer, and that I can't actually remember the last time I ran (was it 10 days ago?) I feel like I did reasonably well. I even beat last years time by 2 min, though last year it was yet warmer and muggy to boot.

It's always nice to crack 10min, but my body did darn near that even though I gave it virtually no support. I'm glad to have run even if I haven't been training, because it's a lovely stretch of river and the day was beautiful. Still, next time I'll put in a few more runs before the race.

Bear number: 159.

So, one of the things I never managed to do in Boston was to see the Red Sox at Fenway Park. I now have added incentive since a friend of mine is singing the National Anthem. But she couldn't sing it on any normal night, no, she happened to draw the first game against the Cardinals, which is apparently the team against which the Red Sox broke the 86-yr World Series curse. Cue the sound of cashiers going "Ka-Ching!"

This is baseball, the all-American sport, the game you bring your eight year old son to and buy him a hotdog. But how in the world can people afford it? Standing room only seats cost from $40 to $389, where you huddle behind the grandstands and peer through. If you want an actually seat for your four hour game, it'll cost you at least $60, but bring your binoculars since you'll be in the upmost bleachers. Tickets go all the way up to $2900 (seriously!!?) for which I hope you at least get close enough to be splashed with tobacco spittle. Seriously folks. It's a game. And I don't think it's all people with Dolce & Gabbana handbags out there. I think we've somehow convinced working americans that it's right and proper to spend $150 a seat to watch baseball, just like we've convinced them half an annual salary is the "appropriate" price of a wedding. Or maybe it's not a family thing anymore. Maybe it's all 20- and 30- something bachelors with too much money and not enough beer?

I may still wander down to Fenway to wait for three hours on game day and pick up the few same-day tix they release to the plebes. I want the experience, but folks, this ain't the Met. Please be reasonable!

Here's the last batch of books to donate. Pipe up if you like them. (The unclaimed ones from the last list are included here, too.)

( Get 'em while they're hot!! )

It's been six months since my last review and I've been reading all the while. However, rather than start with the oldest, I'll start with the newest. This one is Oil!, which was purported to be the basis of the movie There Will Be Blood. The movie felt like a good but inadequate effort to capture a long novel with intense conflict and interesting characters, and I wanted to see more of what seemed to be a lifelong rivalry between the two lead characters, J Ross and the preacher Eli.

( Something Completely Different (with spoilers for the book AND the movie) )
It's not a great novel, but it has made me think, and that's what I'm sure Sinclair wanted me to do. I still wish I could read the non-existent novel behind There Will Be Blood but I suppose if I wish that, I should write it myself. Instead of fascinating characterizations, I'm left with a little nausea at the immutable nature of the political machine.

To my horror, the few books scattered around are not so few. If I really want to reduce to the number of shelves I actually have, I need to purge a LOT of books. Here is the first round. Let me know if you have any interest.

( Local guides, Mathematics, Reference, Photography, Aromatherapy, Language, Fiction, Textbooks )

The only thing I have a little second thought about are the three guides to biking in the area. I loves them! But they would do so much better in the hands of someone who will use them. Anyone?

EDIT: You guys are wonderful! Thank you for finding room in your homes for my books!

Feeling much better after dinner out with new friends. T (who is also a non-trad woman starting med school this year) and her husband P and I went out for Thai in Coventry. It was tasty, and gave us an opportunity to share stories and thoughts and reservations and ideas about the next year. And above all, company! I'd noticed a slump, but hadn't really tagged it to the fact that I've been eating alone at restaurants all weekend. I'm pretty independent, but really, sitting with a book is not as fun as sitting with people! (Okay, okay, I admit! I'm an extrovert!)

So now my stomach and my spirit are full and content.

Success! I managed to get the apartment that I flew out for! Yes, I looked at other places, but this was the one that seemed best, and now I have a lease and everything!

The things I knew before I moved in: my roommates would be two women, a medical student and a pharmacology student. I'd have the whole third floor (a finished attic), and the landlords live next door in the other half of the duplex. Cats okay.

The things I learned after I signed the lease: S plays cello and once was accepted as a Tanglewood Fellow (way more prestigious than just singing in the chorus!) and the med school a capella group "Docapella" rehearses in my very own living room! S was making banana pancakes for everyone when I stepped out, so there's promise of sharing food. The landlords are fabulous, barely older than me, and PhD engineers. Huzzah!

Things that will be interesting: As an attic space it's basically one bedroom and a lot of nooks where the ceiling comes lower. I also have my own bathroom. I'm not quite sure what I will do with the oddly shaped spaces, but I'm sure I will find some way to fit everything in. Also, they are getting a kitten and my cats haven't had to deal with other cats in a long time! I'm hoping that a wee kitten poses no threat to their dominance, so hopefully things will be amicable.

Sigh. And for a moment there I was despairing. I have an address! and nifty seeming roommates! and good landlords! and a beautiful house in a bright and shiny neighborhood close to campus. Huzzah!