Dear reader(s),

I don't think any of you have seen me on one of my weepy days. They happen on occasion and I'm basically just teary the whole day. (Don't try to blame it on ho-mones, it isn't that.) Today I started crying when I thought about the first time Harry received birthday cards, when I read Emma Watson's IMDb page, when I read this article and this blog and when I looked up my new zip code. Today just feels really monumental.

I'm happy and excited for tomorrow. I have a grown-up watch now! I've thought about starting another blog specifically for med school stuff but have abandoned the idea for now. I haven't forgotten about my various promises to write about healthcare reform and all that. It'll happen at some point.

I think Meredith might get kind of freaked out when she realizes just how much Hannah Montana paraphernalia I have.

In sum, I'm not going anywhere. I will continue to type nonsense here (and on twitter, tumblr, facebook, and google+...) and maybe sometimes show my face in public. don't fret.

Happy Harry Potter day,

love,

Tyra

This blog post would be better in 3D

There's a list on the school website called "Things you need to do before orientation". I've distilled it here:

• PANIC

also, so much anger and resentment toward doctors in the comments of this article: Why Would Anyone Choose to Become a Doctor?

Obviously, I'm far from concretely deciding on a field of medicine to go into but I'd be lying if I said that primary care had ever seriously crossed my mind. This isn't because of the comparably low salary but because it seems so frustrating. Primary care physicians (bless 'em) have to deal with a population that pays little care to preventive action or to long-term solutions (for example, diet&exercise to combat obesity, which is the real cause of your knee pain, rather than drugs). It seems like parenting. I don't want to nag. Or maybe I'm just naive.
(probably. Whoops.)

This also seems like a reasonable place to put my "Why do you want to be a doctor?" answer. I had a nice memorized one for interviews that I've forgotten, but this one is a little more rambley and therefore more of an actual thought process: "Reaching your full potential" is cheesy, but it's cheese I believe. We can argue about what human rights are all day, but I think everyone has the right to pursue their full potential. And if their body is holding them back from that, I want to fix it. Boom. Go back to your business. I feel pretty durn sure that my own potential lies in removing those obstacles for others. (In addition, insert healthcare access, public/global health philosophizing here)

Of course, we all know that people my age can make really terrible decisions. After all, look who Selena Gomez is dating.

Hey-o.

p.s. Obvious candidates for Lesbian Sunday (instead of Saturday, just this one time)...all the awesome lesbians who got married in New York today! whee!

p.p.s. Important petition! Getting birth control covered under all insurance plans, without co-pay. Remember, it's cheaper than a kid. (Also, is prescribed for a variety of other issues, such as menstrual regulation and severe acne. But you knew that. Go sign it!)

P.S. Anniversary

This is a story about a pair of doomed white pants.

White pants always give me pause. It's like they exist to invite terrible things to happen to them. One day I was strolling in the Himalayas (sort of) and noticed two large red splotches below the knee of my-- yes, white pants. The splotches were growing and darkening and I frantically tried to come up with an explanation. Had I bumped into something? Had a forceful collision with a tree branch and forgotten about it? Alas, I could think of nothing plausible. The leftover humidity from a recent rainfall made it difficult to roll up the denim, but I eventually managed to reveal a few inches. All I could see was blood, smeary and covering almost the entire bottom half of my leg. I kept rolling and still couldn't find the source of the blood, continuing to imagine the worst.

Anyway, the source turned out to be an itsy-bitsy scratch, not even a quarter of an inch across.

I really wanted this to be a metaphor for something.

Also, it is the one-year anniversary of this blog. Thanks for cyber-hanging out with me, nebulous and possible imaginary crowd of readers. I'm coming back soon!!