A New Way of Life

19 days.

It's been 2 weeks and 5 days since I've begun this ridiculous adventure into the world of action potentials, protein compositions, and Einstein's glial cells. Who would've thought that my life would have dichotomized so completely in a little less than a month? It was not so long ago that I was deep in my knees in Shakespearean literature, seeing life through the post-modernist eyes of T.S. Eliot. What a wasteland it is.

Happy memories. Memories of London, the Royal College of Surgeons, and the aroma of tasty pastys while traveling through the brightly colored Underground. I can just barely remember the joys of a great glass of wine, spending entire evenings and early mornings wandering around the city trying to keep my friends from passing out in the middle of the street in a drunken stupor.

Now what?

Now I drink beer in the middle of the afternoon after a 3-hr exam. Some things never change, and yet they're never quite the same.

I may never again eat another Digestive biscuit in Regent's Park, but I sure as heck am going to enjoy a bottle of wine with friends.

And this time I will know exactly why they're vomiting.

Donde estas, life?

As I embark on this lovely journey that is called medical school, there is one thing that becomes very apparent very quickly: you have no life. Having come out of the working world, I had heard rumors of this pseudo-state of isolation, but never actually allowed myself to believe in this sad, sad fact. In fact, as proof of my non-living status, I recently got a phone call that went as follows:

Someone in the Real World: "Hello, is this LAG?"
Me: Yes
SRW: I'm just calling to confirm a reservation for two at TenPenh for 5:30pm this evening
Me: Uhh....(clueless. Wondering if it has anything to do with posttranslational protein modification, which it clearly doesn't. Damn)
SRW: Ma'am? Are you still there?
Me: Um, could you just cancel that reservation?
SRW: Sure. We're sorry you can't make it, but we hope you will come back another time.

So after hanging up the phone I realized that I had made reservations for restaurant week with a friend of mine who went on vacation. That was when I was a real person and went out to places like restaurants, drinking wine and having normal non-science conversations with actual people. Now I just sit in my room and have conversations with myself about protein trafficking.

Yes, I'm going to savor this journey for the next four years.