Have you ever opened up a journal or diary from when you were an adolescent and just cringed? You probably wrote about how the world was ending because your crush didn't smile at you one day, or how your parents were "the worst," or maybe how you were so in love with your boyfriend/girlfriend and you were certain it would never end. . .
And then you put it away and think "Thank God I've grown up!" Those written mementos, melodramatic as they may be, are valuable reminders of how things change with time, perspective, and maturity. When we write them we have no concept of how to contextualize the problems into a larger picture, into a timeline of personal development that will inevitably reshape and resize the roles of those problems in our lives. And although reading them can be painful ("OMG I can't believe I thought that!"), they are a great means of measurement for how far we've come in life. Well, apparently our capacity for melodrama doesn't always mellow with age.
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A couple months ago I found myself at large, relaxed Shabbat lunch filled with about 15 people, half of whom were new to me. I eventually wandered my way into a conversation with two young women where we spoke about our careers, their dating lives, and my marriage. One of them had recently started dating a medical student and was trying to wrap her head around his education, so I began explaining the detailed process of becoming a doctor - not just getting the MD with your medical school diploma, but the training that follows. After what ended up being a rather long explanation, she said with eyes wide: "Wow, I bet your husband wouldn't be able to describe your career training so well!" |
AuthorNashira is a music teacher and proud Small-Town Jew who, after surthriving six years in Brooklyn for her husband's surgical residency, is finally back in Wisconsin where she belongs! At least until the end of the two-year surgical fellowship, that is. It's a wild ride, and she's ready to tell you all about it! Archives
September 2019
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