It’s been a delightful evening. D_ was in from D.C. with his little girlfriend of two years who I hadn’t met until hours ago. They’re cute. She’s just the right kind of able-minded Midwestern keen to balance his narcissistic, obscenely motivated personality. D_ and I know each other from college, from the brief romantic mingling that we each knew wouldn’t ever work because we were a. too similar and b. not sexually compatible. But we learned that lesson quickly and when he moved to D.C. for a job I helped him pack the U-Haul. Kind of nice, a purely platonic relationship.
Now that D_ comes to Mt View once a month for work, I get to see him regularly and we typically meet for dinner and talk about all the could-bes and maybes that we both cast in present tense. Neither of us is a liar but we’re both easily excited and tend to be struck with a feeling like “there is really something big going on here and we see it and something has to be done immediately.” So conversation is fun. This time, however, was slightly more subdued because D_ likes the west coast, has an offer with relocation in writing, and is trying to convince his girl that the Bay Area really is the best place on earth. In any case, they both work for a healthcare consulting firm, so it’s good for me to spend time with them and learn about healthcare as an industry and listen to rants about which surgical specialties will be phased out by technology in the next ten years….. Actually that part makes me want to swallow a little bit of my own vomit, but nonetheless, better to stay abreast of business. They don’t catalog industry projections for shrinks and couldn’t really give me a good reason why, but I’m gonna put it to rest by assuming that people aren’t getting any saner. We (and by “we,” I am throwing myself into the future contingent of zany psychiatrists) will always be in demand.
But back to D_ and Midwestern Girl. I sat there tonight at NOPA, one of my favorite restaurants in the city, and I felt glad. Glad that I was there sharing a meal with a friend, glad that we could be friends, glad that I liked his girl, and most of all, glad that I was sitting on my own side of the table. There are so just many more-likely places I could find myself right now. There really are. I could be married to my high school/part of college boyfriend with a huge rock on my finger, gallivanting around my least favorite city in the country as some kind of stupid arm candy. I could be battling with my pedantic demons in a PhD program. I could be single and broke, writing for some zine out of a shoebox in Alphabet City replete with coffee, cigarettes and the occasional afterglow of a good fuck. Or, I could have decided to invest myself entirely in my current job, stick with it for two more years, and then throw myself at MBA admissions committees hoping to postpone the overhaul of my own priorities until at least 30. God, I am so pleased not to be faced with any of these lives right now. I am so pleased with the life that I have.
Tonight was a good night because I realized that the life I AM living, (especially the one in t minus two months) is just what I want it to be. The decisions I’ve made are mine and they’ve been chiseled out through a hell of a lot of hard contemplation. I used to often joke about marrying a pediatrician, just to end the saga of complicated relationships and agonizing love, to tie a bow around the version of my life that my parents can digest, can happily morph into wedding registries and china patterns. But I have decided that it is better to strive to be what I admire — to become the physician — than think about playing hard at Wife. Plus, pediatricians, at this stage of the game, strike me as not a little boring. In any case, I look at my parents, my mother in particular, and think to myself what a sad life she leads. That after a half century of living, she is still hesitant to have an opinion, that she is roaming around a house that will be remodeled 12 more times before she understands that no one is ever going to give her the permission she’s waiting for. Sad, yes. It’s sad. But it is not my life. I am going to be wonderful. I’m going to give Lacan a run for his money and treat the worried well and the indigent crazy and little boys and girls will read my books and be pleased with me the way that I am pleased with Winnicott. Ah! My hubris. I always get too much ahead of myself.
I hope I actually have a reader or two who can console when I’m inundated with MCAT flashcards and pushing hard to break 30 on that fucker of a test. I hope I have someone around who will remind me that I really am wonderful and that the world needs me to do this. And I guess, most of all, I hope that in two years, beyond the terror and sweat and anguish of this hellish process, I will know that this becoming is still something that I absolutely want. Cause there’s only more to come. For now though, for tonight, I am glad.
First time reader and currently second year student. I was in your position roughly 3-4 years ago – Bay area cubicle slave turned med student. School can be rough sometimes but thanks for reminding me why I did it in the first place! Good luck with the whole process!