Friends Gone By

I've been thinking a lot about friendship lately. Mainly because there is a lot going on with my own friend group and it feels particularly applicable. This post will probably be quite a bit of rambling and a little bit of my own exposition. Probably a handful of humorous links in there as well, provided I can remember relevant ones and find them too (a daunting proposition if I'm being honest with myself).

People, by the simple fact of being human, need contact with other people. There are of course, outliers that shun this idea of community, but this is not the norm by any stretch of the imagination. This need for contact is apparent, obviously so, in the fact that we function as a society. Indeed, we are even breaching national lines and growing to a global society. A community of individuals (a city, a neighborhood, a church, etc.) is this need being fulfilled on the large-scale. On the opposite end, the small-scale, is friendship. This very personal relationship between two people consists (usually) of a mutual trust and faith in one another, emotional support, and common interests. From this base, there are as many unique examples of friendship as there are comics in Questionable Content (in other words, too damn many to talk about in a single sitting). Like branches on a tree, each friendship spiders out into numerous definitions based on each individual need of the people involved. Keeping with the tree-analogy, a single person may have many different friendships like the branches of a tree. Some may be sturdy and supportive branches, others wispy and superficial, while many fall in between the two. Regardless of the type of friendship/branch, all types support and define the tree. Branches can grow and become more and more of the tree, just as friends can mean more and more to a person. If a branch gets infected, it must be removed or it will spread. Likewise, an infected and negative friend needs to be removed or distanced from you if you want to live a healthy life (this type of health is about mental and emotional health typically... although, physical health can be at stake as well). The requirements for a friendship to occur between two people are so minimal, if any effort is made by both parties, the seed will be set and a friendship begun. For example, two completely opposite people, from different worlds, can connect because of the most random events - case in point, Legolas and Gimli forged a friendship that began in mutual hatred and distrust before realizing that they were not so different as they thought.

As for the application in my life, I love and cherish my friends very much. As a person, I am rather quiet and introverted (IFTJ the last time I checked), my friends are typically very close and deep friends but are also not numerous at all. The ideal for me is a core group of close friends that I can trust intimately and that can trust in me to the same degree, sharing quality time and adventures together... or if I'm being honest, more likely Netflix on a couch with a pizza delivery on the way (I'm looking at your Jackie). I thank God that I have found this in both Kansas City as well as Oklahoma City. The friendships that I share remind me every day to be thankful for them and the security they bring. This is not to say, however, that my identity is wrapped up in my friends. In fact, by no means is this true. Independence is just as important to me as community. Regardless, my friends and I have effects on each other. Most of them are positive, a few of them are neutral, and a very small amount are negative. From romantic friendship with my girlfriend, to the friends that I have been cultivating for my entire life, to the budding friend that I'm just now able to explore.

The flip side of the beginning of friendships is the end of friendships. Not typically a subject that is viewed in a good light, but I think that - in the case of a diseased branch of a tree analogy - it is necessary and a healthy action that must occur if the self is to survive intact and wholesome. There are friends who gently fade away into obscurity, simply losing contact and growing apart from each other - these are the easiest to deal with, but perhaps the saddest, because there once was such vibrancy between these two people. But there are also friends that violently leave through anger or hurt - perhaps the hardest to deal with, but also not uncommon. Perhaps this person became someone that you didn't like (or more likely were always this person but you never saw it), or perhaps there was a disagreement that could not be settled, or maybe some other thing separated them from you. Pain and hurt follow this, betrayal and doubt too. My favorite way (odd to say it that like that) to be separated from a friend is through death. Because then you know that nothing has separated the two of you and you've conquered the world together.

Too many ideas are floating through my head right now... and too much coffee. Fingers shaking and brain going in circles. I'm going stop here and probably take a fat nap somewhere (my bed if I can make it there without passing out) to relax. Until next time y'all.

"Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend." - Albert Camus

The Opening of a Chapter

Quite a lot has happened since we last convened (and I'm seeing a trend in the distances that separate my posts). But nevertheless, I remain active in the sense that I have not given up on this blog. Therefore, I'll  regale you the stories and thoughts that have been on my mind recently, as per my "usual".

As of January 12th, I started classes at the University of Central Oklahoma as a junior with a biology major. Classes so far have been a nice change of pace from those at UMKC, with smaller class sizes and a new campus to explore! I am excited to see where this new direction will take me in the coming months and years. I will say, because some of my classes are mandatory entry-level classes, being surrounded by freshmen is rather annoying... I wonder if I was that bad when I was just starting college. Oh who am I kidding, of course I was that bad; probably worse even.

The past year has been fraught with events that will have a lasting impact on my life and I can't wait to take them to fruition. As I am now in Edmond, OK, I am no longer living in Kansas City. To that end, and because I really did not wish to commute 5 hours to school every day, I am living in an apartment with a very good friend of mine. This too has brought about a shift in how I carry myself. Instead of a group of four college males (and between one and two girlfriends) often living in tighter quarters, sharing one bathroom, and not actually having a closet of my own, I have a much less stressful morning (yes, morning... thanks to an 8am class) preparation, my own bathroom, and my own closet! Such changes are very welcome in my life because I can now appreciate them more than I could if I had come from something less severe. A glass (or tumbler, you alcoholic snobs) of whiskey, good music and conversation, and relaxation are my evenings now. No TV in the living room to distract me (although I did watch a few episodes of Netflix of my tablet this morning before I got up), and plenty of fridge space so I can cook more healthy meals nowadays. Also, I can now enjoy much better coffee too... Freshly hand ground coffee that was roasted recently and purely brewed in a Chemex as opposed to an automatic coffeemaker. Enjoying the finer things in life as a college student is not something that I saw myself doing but now am taking the opportunity to experience (without spending money of course).

A very good friend of mine put what I am feeling into a tangible and honest form, like she most often does; "It is not the case that you're not wishing to be where you are in your life in Edmond, but that you are missing the parts of your life that are in Kansas City. Furthermore, it is not even the city that you miss but the emotions, feelings, stories, journies, and friendship that you share(d) with the people you met in Kansas City." I find it hard to believe that there are better summations of where I am in this area of my life. I yearn incessantly for the reunion of my separated friends and I... Even if some of them are not as in touch as I wish they would be. I cannot wait for my Spring Break when my plans include traveling to KC to do just that.

I look forward, as I have said too many times in this post, to the next semester and will make sure that I share as much as I dare with you, the one reader who checks this blog out. Until next time. Allons y!

The Closing of a Chapter

Hello my non-existent readers, its been a while hasn't it? Well there may or may not be a very good, rather not-enjoyable explanation for my apparent absence. A lot has happened since we left and I guess I should let you know what's going on. First I'd like to say that I'm continuing this blog but it may have a slightly different approach than before.

I'll just get it out now. I am no longer in UMKC's medical program. There, it's out. I voluntarily withdrew from the program after this summer due to some events over that semester and over the course of my time in the medical school. I won't go into too great of detail about it but my grandmother (from here on out in my blog I'll call her my Te'te... which is an Arabic word for grandmother) passed away this summer. It tore out a hole in me and put me into an emotional tailspin that I did not think possible. I pretty much disregarded any schoolwork as important and grieved the loss of a very precious person in my life. My grades suffered from this and, though I recovered and continued to perform well in class, the damage was already done and I was put up for separation and was scheduled to meet before the Council to plead my case. I went through this before and did not wish to go through it again so after my meeting I withdrew from the program. This decision did not come lightly however. There was a great deal of soul searching and reflective contemplation within myself and between me and my family. While I did have to give up on the 6-year medical school... I am NOT giving up on my life goal of becoming a physician. I'm pre-med, working on getting into medical school somewhere, and continuing through to my M.D.

Now on to my normal self again. It's been quite a while since this decision and I've stuck with it. The only negatives I have found is that it is extremely hard and embarrassing to tell my friends (both in and out of the med school) that I'm no longer in the program. Friends, family, or just people in general that know me. I'm slightly ashamed of it and think that people have held me to a standard that was too high for me to achieve... regardless of if that's actually true or not. But this too will pass in time. This semester has been going well so far, but it's had a fair share of ups as well as downs and we're only halfway through. But it will turn out alright and as it should in the end.

I look forward to continuing this blog, but I'll be writing a blog of just my thoughts and ramblings now, and the occasional story of life as I see fit to post it. I wish you a good day and now I must get back to studying physics... it's kicking my butt!

"Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish." - John Quincy Adams

A Reflection on Silence

Hello all in the blagotubes (explanation here). Tonight I'm writing to you because I really can't stand the quiet in my house at the moment despite my Little Green Cars Pandora station tunefully crooning away from my laptop and I need a distraction. The house is quiet because the remaining residents of this homestead have left for a couple of weeks for their summer breaks. This inevitably means that our constant banter back and forth, shouting from upstairs in desperate tones to stop the flushing of the toilet while they take showers (guilty), and general camaraderie is severely lacking at the moment. It's just slightly eerie to walk through a house that normally holds so much life to find it suddenly dormant and silent.

There are plenty of different silences in this world actually. There is the well-known awkward silence as in the one that follows and introduction but you don't know how to continue the conversation or make an adroit exit without looking too desperate. Also there is the contemplative silence that falls between a contented pair of friends as you gaze up into the dark night sky that is peppered with bright pinpricks of light, infinitesimally small streams of photons on a journey ending on your eye (relevant and thoughtful link). Don't forget the wondrous silence that occurs when two people simply  must gaze upon one another to hold an entire conversation in their heads, never having to open their mouths except for a smile at the end that nobody sees because it is buried in the heart of the other person's warm embrace. However, there are dark silences as well. The silence that follows a realization of the terrible, like in the instance where you immediately know that it wasn't the brachiocephalic branch but the left subclavian that was the answer on the final you just finished taking. Or perhaps the somber silence of remembrance for one who has been lost, perhaps someone you knew for your entire life but it could also be someone that you've never known before but somehow they touched your life in this small way.

The silence I have ringing incessantly in my ears is altogether a different silence though. Neither happy nor sad, this silence comes from the absence of vital, vivacious, and vibrant life but is not so horrible as all that. It is quite pensive as well and I have been able to do plenty of wonderful thinking about a great many things (not least of which is my studies in cellular biology... Frizzled Wnt receptors and Disheveled activating proteins and such). But at the same time I reflect and miss the intensity of living with other human beings and the interactions that I can share with them. Being alone is a very necessary thing for me to live a sane life (or something resembling sanity at least) but so is friendship and human contact. Quick phone calls while a dear friend drives to Wal-Mart, conversations about Marvel making Thor a woman (seriously though... what the heck Marvel?) over a Facebook message, or a brief check-in with people half a continent away do not really count and being a hermit (however romantically appealing it may be) is not really something I would like to put on my resume.

This mood will pass, as do all of my darker more serious moods, when I wake up tomorrow. There is something about the birth of a new morning that refreshes my mind. I don't know what it is but I see correlations to it and the magic in the Dresden Files that washes away with the dawning of a new sun and the birth of a new day (slightly cheesy yes, but it is strikingly similar).

Well, my laundry is now done and I feel that I've said about all that must be said at the moment. If you've actually clicked on all of those links, I'm sure that you've seen quite a few from webcomic xkcd and that would be because in addition to thinking and studying and contemplating silence, I've been on the internet browsing comics that appeal to a little bit nerdier and sarcastic clientele. Needless to say, this one fits the bill. You should check it out. Goodnight all.

“Music and silence combine strongly because music is done with silence, and silence is full of music.” - Marcel Marceau

P.S. I really hope that the future doesn't remember us like this.

A Brief History: Part I

Hello folks, today I'm going to try and give you a little bit of history of things. I'll only go so far as to cover up to the end of high school for the moment and leave out the last two years of medical school as well as my passions for the medical field and what drew me to choosing it as a career. I'll cover those in other posts at a later time.

To start off with, I was born. There. We've started. Yay us!

The rest of my life after this rather violent event has really just been a series of fortunate and unfortunate mishaps that have led me to where I am today (uh... and that would actually be sitting in my spot at K-Place and writing this blog post, watching YouTube videos about perpetual motion, and listening to some awesome Young the Giant and The Postal Service songs).

We can skip past infancy, elementary education, and most of that dreaded time in most humans' lives they like to call puberty but is really just a black spot of awkwardness in any person's timeline. Suffice it to say that I was an ornery and know-it-all child that nursed a hatred of bananas and an affinity towards the outdoors and picking on (perhaps a bit too strongly) my younger siblings... however, I doubt my childhood was any worse for wear from these things and in fact, my dislike of bananas I believe has strengthened who I am today.  I was homeschooled, went to a Biosciences and Medicine Academy (BSMA) for my Junior and Senior years of high school, was extremely active in my Boy Scout troop (was honored with the Eagle rank) and the local Order of the Arrow (Vigil Honor for all of you out there who might know what I'm talking about), and generally enjoyed learning about a myriad of different interests.

All throughout high school I was doing stuff outside of the classroom that were really enjoyable. I went to national conventions for HOSA (look it up, I'm not going to explain everything!) as a part of an academic team for two years through the BSMA, I went on some high-adventure, week-long trips to New Mexico and Canada to backpack and canoe through the wildernesses we encountered there, and I also went to a community college my senior year for a semester and got my EMT-Basic training/licence which was awesome!

Summers were spent on trips with school or Boy Scouts, some family vacations, and random high school stuff like concerts with "awesome" bands, lots of Starbucks, and plenty of just hanging out and reading lots of books in my spare time. Overall, it was a fairly problem-free childhood and actually prepared me fairly well for being on my own in college/medical school.

Sometime soon I hope to continue my story towards medical school, to catch up on everything that has happened pre-blog. Until then enjoy your lives, enjoy your sleep more, and don't get into too much trouble.

“Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.”

An Ominous Beginning

Hello to those of you that either will follow this blog from the beginning and are reading this shortly after I post it, those devoted readers who follow me after a number of posts and read to the very last page, or those of you who are impatient or otherwise engaged and just skipped to the very first post. To all of you, no matter your origins, I bid you a good evening.

I probably should first establish some ground rules (which will inevitably change as this blog hopefully continues and lengthens). First off this will be a blog chronicling my journey through medical school and possibly beyond. I will not have any regular postings but will try to post with some frequency about my life as I see it. These posts will encompass a wide variety of topics including, but not limited to, medical school classes, administration encounters, living arrangements, life encounters, and opinions as I see fit to share them.

I am currently in my second year of medical school at the University of Missouri in Kansas City (I'll do my best to periodically fill you in on my life before now and how amazing it was until I decided to start a blog) and am planning on another five years of school here (I'm going through a 7-year curricular route). That's probably about all I'm gonna write for now. It's late and my roommates just started watching World War Z so obviously my attention is being diverted elsewhere and now I have to watch it. I'll try posting some of the history of the past two years fairly frequently at first.

About here is where I'll have a fun catchphrase or something to end all of my blog posts... for now you just get this. Enjoy!

"A journey of a thousand miles must begin with the first step" - Rafiki