2010: A M.D. Odyssey

I don't think it's any secret that science is not my first love. Or even first like. If we were doing Fuck, Chuck or Marry for academic disciplines and my options were science, paper engineering or... I don't know, something truly heinous... ORGANIZATIONAL LEADERSHIP (You should know I deleted Elementary Ed. That's how much I've grown as a person.), science would definitely get the chuck.

That's right. I would rather have a hot n' dirty fling with pulp (or whatever the hell paper's made of) and spend my life doing fanciful pretend things like consulting and motivating then spend any more time than necessary with science.

In undergrad I made the grievous error of majoring in something science-ical instead of biting the bullet and trying to be happy already. I tried to reconcile my bio and physics classes by filling in my electives with such gems as "Acting For the Non-Major," and "Social Dancing." The piece de resistance of what came to be known as my Quality of Life Electives was to be a course entitled "Popular Literature."

Mmmmm. Popular literature... aren't the images of Oprah's Book Club and The NYTimes Best Seller's list so snuggly? Wouldn't you want to cuddle up to a course like that, so much so that you might dangle it in front of yourself as a beacon of incentive to finish your four years in a science program? Well I did.

I waited until the second semester of my senior year to register for "Popular Literature" as my prize for surviving 3.5 years of my heinous heinous major. What better way to congratulate yourself than to take a 100 level trek down pleasure reading road.

Oh... what a fool... I was.

Evidently this "Popular Literature," IF THAT WAS EVEN IT'S REAL NAME, masqueraded about as a seemingly desirable class when in real life it was the biggest crock of poop since the 2004 election. THE GENRES CHANGE. Nobody tells you that. THE GENRES. CHANGE.

One semester it might be romance, another mysteries, still another... westerns! All good, acceptable, and above all... TOLERABLE, genres.

What is the genre the semester I take it?

Long time readers may recall, it was SCIENCE FUCKING FICTION.

I'm not proud of the fact that I actually took the course. I am even less proud of the papers I had to write for it and the things I had to say, aloud, for people to hear, in that class in order to pass. I did a presentation on THE FEMININE MYSTIQUE OF SCIENCE FICTION FOR CRYING OUT LOUD -- Do you even know what that means? Do you know what I had to do? What I had to research? Fictional women with THIRD BOOBS and MECHANICAL PARTS and how that affects PROGRESSIONIST SOCIAL THEORY and I... I... really don't want to talk about it anymore.

Suffice it to say, I was angry. Ohhhhhh was I angry. It's two years later and Disturbingly Potent can probably still hear my SF ranting when she tries to fall asleep at night.

There I was, a mild mannered fluffy-fictional literature enthusiast, trapped in a bio major's sad, pitiful life, and all I wanted was a little escapism. A little... escape from electrophysiology. An escape from comparative vertebrate anatomy.

I DIDN'T PLAN ON ESCAPING TO PLANET FREAKSHOW.

I guess I should've been more specific... or perhaps consulted the course description a little more thoroughly.

What happened was I read the course description once... probably when it was being offered as a cool permutation (because honestly, how great would it be to have an entire course on trashy romance novels?)... and got it in my head that it was the best thing ever.

I worked towards it. I had this vision of what it would be. It was my motivator.

And then when I got there I was just like... wtf karma, wtf. And ho ho ho, I HAAAAAAAAD to take it because YES. I SAVED IT UNTIL THE VERY LAST POSSIBLE OPPORTUNITY AND NEEDED THAT CREDIT TO GRADUATE. There was nothing left for me except science fiction. And thus, I had to endure. I had no choice.

Occassionally I feel that what science fiction was to my undergrad career, medicine may be to my life.

I fleetingly once thought, "hey cool, I want to save lives" filed that away in the back of my head, worked and worked to get there, and then when it was finally time I stopped to look around and thought... Wait a minute... this isn't what I signed up for. But I'm here now. I've got nothing else. I have to finish.

This week is just one of those weeks that makes me wonder how... in the world... I let this happen.