dedalus:coming home

I love thinking. It's something really human we have to get good at and, some days, overcome.



For instance, it's hard to think that this time 5 years ago I was heavily involved in Plato, Hesse, Kant, and Freud. I would meet weekly with a man I call "the professor" to discuss my important struggle trying to reconcile religion and cognition as I know it. I was dating a stunningly controlling but very cunning black haired girl from my hometown. We would rave about the environment and the system.



The next year I was still confused with college. Still, I would meet the professor and the black haired girl to hash out how to save the planet and my eternal soul. Conversations had weight. I was dating a lovely, dainty, brilliant Chinese girl at the time. Wrapped up in living fast I went skydiving, and fled to Spain for the first time. 2008 was a great and terrible year.



The next year I was reeling from a mistake that took 5 minutes to accomplish but forever to explain. I was timid and focused on interpreting literature. However, I didn't take much of a driving soul from the books. At this time my mother had been diagnosed with RSD and I sought to do nothing but learn everything about the disease. Literature, Spanish, some parties, and biology were my  foundation for life.



Junior year I snapped off with the classes. 20 credit hours a term. I was then dating a beautiful, tall, intelligent woman from WV and experimenting with poetry and creative fiction. My writing became more important and my connection with the fraternity strengthened. Everything in life revolved around school, girls, friends, good times, and literature with thought took a back seat. It was a cold winter night when I was wrapped up in blankets and overcoats that I knew I shouldn't see someone. I did, and passed some great time with her. Unfotunately, that came at the expense of my ochem study.



The next year I balanced everything perfectly. Pizza, labs, and MCAT were all I focused on. With medical school and the rest of my life on the horizon I had one thing to think about: my decision. Should I stay with the women and friends I had won through the years of study, working various jobs, and volunteering to help the environment. Would the hippies, bros, biologists, and friends from the woodwork forget about me as time passed? Could I possibly find something better across the Atlantic ocean? Like Daedalus, I chose flight. It wasn't for fear or wanting to reinvent myself after my mistake in 2008...it was for the desire to grow in unfathomable ways.



The unplanned happened. On my summer trip I had a problem with the background check that cost me 4 months of work here. I plunged into the life of a college graduate without a masters degree: factory and restaurant work. I had a comfortable life. Working 65 hours a week is something that one gets used to. Working 16, as now, is something I'm not used to yet after 4 full months here.



But, now here I am in the 5th year since strutting my high school stage. Degrees under my belt and itchy feet wanting to wander...I wonder: I didn't get into medical school this past time. I got my last rejection letter in April. A terrible feeling creeps up your spine at the thought that your total will and the summation of your efforts are not enough. I've been meeting people with the phrase "no one person rejects you. your approach and conversation is a situation. they know nothing of your struggles, apprehensions, passions, or positive attributes. they reject a certain string of words or phrases in a situation at a given time. you're just a moment when they say 'yes' or 'no.' so you can't take it personally."



Getting rejected from a school is different. You tell them your accomplishments, struggles, personal habits, past experiences, and EVERYTHING that matters. Maybe I need to get better at putting my life on paper...but having them say "no" to all those sleepless nights with ochem, evo, biocalc, biochem, phys, dev, and all the other crap I learned...is shredding. This time I'm earlier. I hope that makes a difference.



So here I am in year 5. I am no longer the philosopher I was in high school. I am a weathered scientist with an unwavering desire to understand how my body works. I want to know my neurons so that I can cure dysfunction in the nociceptors that give my mother constant pain. That's the naked construction that I have been forcefed by experience.



Dedalus flew away from people's responsibility: they asked him to be a great poet of Ireland. They wanted him to be catholic, they wanted him to be their champion, they wanted him in a role. I felt the same pressures growing up. The professor wanted me to teach philosophy (he got his wish more or less), the black haired girl wanted me to write (I guess this counts a bit), and my family pushed for medicine. Here I am a wanderer; I learn from the school of experience and speak in my native language for profit.



I am successful and happy here. I make a decent wage, have satisfying work, and am living in one of the most beautiful places in the world. When offered the position caring for nutrition in children in the appalachian region I said "no" because I wanted this job. Now I'm forced into a decision time again. The uncertainty of the moment is a chaotic bliss.



$500 to apply to medical schools? After transfer and conversion fees from my Spanish work that's 1 1/2 weeks of work. That's a short trip to Amsterdam or Rome. I guess the real question is: is a trip worth the death of a dream?



For the day I am off. Stuck in Madrid because I have 3 euro in change to work with. I get paid this upcoming week but can't go to Salamanca without cash. This is a good thing because it has made me fill out applications all day. Right now I finished my coffee and am going to the gym. Last night it rained and I went to the park for a glass of Mahou. I sat and watched the dogs play in the rain. The moon was full. I could say that I was lonely but that would be a lie. My friend and I were supposed to be together but we never met up.



 Tonight I think I'll reunite with some Americans and Mexicans I met when I first got here. If they don't get back to me I'll call my British friend. When those two fail I take to the streets or parks to meet whoever wants to have a good time or share experience.