Hello in there

Long time, no blog, I know. It's been busy. We're nearing our second block exam, and this time we have seven classes worth of material to manage. It's exciting. That's one word for it. Anyway, one of the classes I am taking right now is a medical humanities class. We learn how to use medical instruments, discuss ethics and philosophy, and generally have a good time. It's taught by a minister who happens to have a medical degree and a wicked sense of humor. All in all, it's an excellent respite from our other six classes. Anyway, tomorrow we have a reflection session. We're all supposed to write (or draw, sing, etc) something that expresses how our medical education has changed us, or how some life event has impacted us. Or something like that. It's all incredibly vague and as such, none of us had started until today. We're lame like that. I kind of liked what I wrote, though. It's a little disjointed, perhaps, but that's how I think and write.
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My medical education has been like facing an extremely well functioning fire hose and trying to drink all of the water in at once. It’s not going to work, clearly. My mouth is not big enough, stretchy enough, and even if it was, my body is not willing to accept such a volume of fluid in one sitting. Instead of water, though, I am faced with a seemingly endless stream of information. I am certain that I can never know all of it, but I’m going to try anyway. Every day, I go to class, open wide, and pray that I don’t miss anything too crucial (aorta? What’s an aorta?). In the end, there’s an awful lot of minutiae to sort through, very little of which is actually important. It is unlikely that I will need to remember the various stages of blood cell development. Here I am, though, cramming it into my head as if it were the meaning of life and I the only person who had gotten the message. If only my brain were big enough, stretchy enough. No, instead of being able to remember the types of adrenergic receptors, I am stuck with the theme song from “The Beverly Hillbillies.” At least it’s not the entire musical catalogue of Monty Python…oh wait. It is. Damn.

It is a precarious balance, this learning of information. We are taking seven classes, all of which are tested or graded in some manner. Some of them are easier than others, but in the end we need to pass them all. This is complicated by the fact that some classes are forgotten until the week before exams. I know I did this with Embryology last block. Unfortunately for me, it worked out really, really well. There are only so many times this will work. We’re going to see if it works with Biochemistry this time around. I am hopeful.

We don’t need to know every last little detail, but I would like to. Sometimes I joke that it would be neat to have a USB port in my head. I could simply stick in a little portable hard drive and download all of the applicable information. This isn’t so much a joke, though, as it is an honest to goodness desire. I want this USB port in my head. Until then, though, I’m going to have to face down this water hose.