The real bother with being back in Loma Linda is that people know me. Now, even apart from my unwarranted reputation this is problematic. See, aunties know they can get help with yard work. Classmates know they can get help with school stuff. Churches know they can get help with music, specifically brassy, trumpety music. That last item is particularly bothersome because I'm quite out of practice. Plus I'm about half as good as I was in high school, which wasn't all that special. I mean, I don't think I was outright terrible. I was probably in that nice middle area where no one would actually remember having heard me play. I'd bet that there's no one who went to high school with me (and who wasn't in band. and let's also discount any stalkers; they're not real people) that remembers me actually playing. I can hardly remember me actually playing. (Except for that one time I played the first movement of the Hummel for chapel, only I had to play it twice because we had split chapel for some reason. And even then I can't remember playing; I just remember being nervous as hell and it didn't help that the two girls I admired most (at the time, though I still think highly of them now, to be sure (and I say this because it's true, and because many of you may know very well who one of those girls is, and because I never know who reads these things (and I know one of those girls has a myspace account)) were in separate chapels but both sat close to the front).
Well that was unnecessarily long. Kinda fun to remember high school though. That's kind of what medical school feels like. Maybe it's just because the class size is smaller, which means you're limited in every class to sitting next to one or two of the same 120-170 (depending on how well the students tolerate the particular lecturer) people. And so, everyday, I sit in the back row and wonder if Kijak or Brian are going to show up for something besides religion and chapel (which are required), watch to see who tries to sit next to who, zone out during the lecture I might have to explain to Danelle and Sarah later, and wait for Tyler to entertain me. And since we're all in the same class, it's not like people in the school have different things to talk about, so we just sit around and agree how we hardly get anything out of Nava's lectures that we couldn't get from the powerpoints or how entertaining Dr. Wilcox is or how wonderful a lecturer Dr. Lewis is (Ndio!) or how we hope we don't have EBM or how nice it is not to have our cardiac ascultation test next Friday.
In some ways, it's a nice thing, because you have enough in common with everyone that it's not hard to make friends. Or at least it's not hard to find something to talk about. That being said, it's ridiculously hard to find something to talk about that's not school related, and therefore many conversations run a risk of being very boring right from the start, only since we are so consumed by this whole med school thing we don't realize how boring any given med school conversation might be, and so we have it anyway and feel quite good about it because it's at least pleasant company. And people generally are quite nice. Or at least smart. Or funny. Or full of him/herself, in which case I end up entertaining myself, usually at the other person's expense (but not to their knowledge, if I can avoid it).
Well, I'm kind of on a roll here, so I'll just go ahead and answer some general questions that people seem to ask me a lot. I will include my normal terse answers that tend to discourage further questioning, so that it actually feels like we're having a conversation here.
(Non med school people) Do you have to study a lot / (Med school people) Have you been studying much?
(Non med school people) Well, a lot by my standards. I study most every day, which is definitely new, but it's not more than 2 or 3 hours. / (Med school people) Some. But I'm so behind!
(Non med school people) How's [insert name of someone they know kinda casually] doing in school? / (Med school people, usually the ones from Andrews) How's your sister?
(Non med school people) Oh, (s)he's doing fine. Hangin' in there, ya know? / (Med school people) Busy, as always. Crazy girl. Oh, but if you see her, ask her about a birthday massage.
(Non med school people) So what are we doing this weekend? / (Med school people) So what are you doing this weekend?
(Non med school people) Church, mountains, football? And this time let's not forget to call Jay/Jonny. / (Med school people) Not much. Studying some.
(Non med school people) How are the lady-types? / (Med school people) How are the lady-types?
(All) [well I usually lie and say something like] Oh, I don't have time for that [but really, my attention just isn't particularly piqued. I suppose I'd be accepting applications. Can't promise to look at them, but I have lots of random stacks of paper in my room, so they'd fit right in and be thematic and all.]
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