1 year later, so much to say.

How apt that I think to post almost exactly a year later from my last post.

School has been so rough for me, admittedly. I'm not failing classes or rotations, nope, I'm exactly average most of the time. Plus I kind of felt like I didn't find my stride for the first 7 months of rotations. Felt like I wasn't going to find anything that lit a spark in me, that I was just going to graduate med school with an "eh" kinda feeling.

I'm really glad things have turned around. I'm excited about the prospect of pursuing OB/Gyn. I've heard all of the terrible things about it, and I know that I'm condemning myself to being overworked and underpaid. And yet, for some reason, it doesn't bother me right now.

Between reading "Half the Sky" over winter break, and going back over everything I've done volunteer work for in the past, I realize that I really care about women. I care so much for their well being and want to help out the most damned women on the planet. The underage sex workers, the latina victims of domestic abuse, the fistula-ridden rape victims in Africa. It all sounds so bleeding heart idealistic, but then, I feel like I'd be such a sellout if I went through my whole life with all this lip service about helping out these kind of people and then not acting on it at all. Living in the 'burbs, getting married, raising kids, owning a dog. IT's what everyone else is doing, right? But I feel like I've gotta respond to this spark. I know, it's a cliche, they say that if you're not liberal when you're 25, you're a coldhearted son of a bitch, but that if you're liberal when you're 50 you're an idiot. Well I hope to be an idiot for the rest of my life.

I really hope I can make my life work out the way I want it to. The problem is, I want it all. I want to be a humanitarian health worker but I also want to keep up with the Jones' to some degree - be able to make all my kids' school events, be able to attend friends' weddings, baptisms, whatever. At this point though, I care more about finding something I'm passionate about. Something I can "write home" about. Hopefully I'll remember this when I'm a grumpy old obstetrician.


Also, have learned to keep my mouth shut. Yes, I like to talk, I like to opine, I like to be as true to myself in public as in private. But I've realized that there are lecherous people out there who will take you down if you show yourself to be vulnerable. I learned that the hard way. No, I'm not angry at the people who spoke badly of me. I probably deserved it to some extent. No, I'm angry at myself for letting them get to me, for expecting a better experience than I got. While I think speaking out is the only way to change things, my sister has reiterated to me that whistleblowers, while good people, often go down. they go down hard, and they go down alone. And when you have a family and financial burdens to take care of, you can't possibly afford to get blacklisted from your own career.

So I'm committing to changing things when I'm finally in a position to do so. Hopefully residency won't break me to the point that I've forgotten what it was like to be a med student. I can already tell that some of my classmates will be this way. But I hope to be a compassionate teaching physician. I hope to be humble enough to tell a student when I don't know the answer, and I hope to welcome any controversial questions rather than strike them down as "questioning authority." I hope to to encourage the questioning of authority because it's shit like that that makes the world run, it's shit like that that makes people better doctors. If you can't explain the reason for doing something, you better figure it out, or else maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place.

Anyway, if people just settled for things, women and black people would still be second-class citizens. So maybe one day I'll be able to work in a hospital environment where there is less hierarchy, less fear of insubordination, and more collaboration. Maybe I'll be able to somehow mobilize disgruntled OB/gyns all around to stand up against opportunistic trial lawyers and try to heal the litiginous climate that has ruined healthcare in this country.

Well, one can at least dream, right?

Imogen Heap - "Just For Now"

wow.

Late-night summer musings

So Regina Spektor's new album, Far, came out on Tuesday. Even though the album is great, I find myself digging through her old stuff and feeling amazed all over again. I know I've said it before, but when she sings, there is a sense of freedom and peace that I don't think I could ever really achieve. I feel it when I hear it, and who knows? Maybe she has internal struggles that she's able to hide through her music, but I would never know the difference. "Field Below" is the perfect song for people like me, who sometimes feel like they're the last people on earth to be awake, or maybe the first people to wake...but hearing this, they know they're not alone. Also it's perfect for us city-dwellers.

Seriously, maybe it's the summer and mental R&R that I've finally afforded myself, but I'm beginning to feel like I could write music again. I hope that it comes back to me soon. It won't happen overnight, and it won't be perfect, but I've gotten to a place where I'm totally ok with it. It's been a long time since I've been in this high of spirits and confident about my abilities to do things. I feel like I'm learning and growing so much that perhaps I can finally put it to words. I miss being able to express myself like that, but there's hope for me yet! Thanks Regina, as always!


I wish I'd see a field below
I wish I'd hear a rooster crow
But there are none that live downtown
And so the day starts out so slow

Again, the sun was never called
And darkness spreads over the snow
like ancient bruises
I'm awake, I feel the ache

Magic (Ben Folds) - University of Chicago Voices In Your Head

Another rendition that gives me chills

Sacramento State Jazz Singers - Selfless, Cold and Composed

Ben Folds held a contest where he picked the best a cappella versions of his songs to record for an album. Awesome idea, and this is one of the better interpretations selected. I hope they make the final cut for the album!

President-Elect Barack Obama on Election Night

Grant Park, Chicago
November 4th, 2008

Jay-Z - History

Now that all the smoke is gone,
And the battle's finally won
Victory is finally ours
History, so long so long

1/17/09 Barack Obama BALTIMORE SPEECH PART 2

1/17/09 Barack Obama BALTIMORE SPEECH PART 1

Obama Stops in Baltimore

I was here! Waited in line since 11:30am and stood around until 4:15 when he actually spoke. Yay Baltimore! Yay Obama!

Jamie Cullum - Gran Torino

This song is the perfect complement to the film. I haven't seen any other major Clint Eastwood movies, but this one was unexpectedly good...totally not what I imagined Clint Eastwood doing. It seems he enjoys doing movies about the underdog. In any case, it's a real gem and, in my opinion, the best underrated movie to come out in 2008 (sure, other then Dark Knight, whatever.)

Audrey Hepburn - Moon River

Beautiful woman, beautiful song

Iraqi Journalist Throws Shoe at Bush

Video of the year. Bush has amazing reflexes...one would think he's probably had to dodge several shoes in the past...

Yngwie Malmsteen Acoustic Guitar Solo

Everyone Else Has Had More Sex Than Me

Hilariously cute. If anyone can find this rabbit in stuffed animal form, let me know!

Fiona Apple- Waltz (Better Than Fine)

Summing up my current mood of the day.


If you don't have a song
To sing you're okay
You know how to get along
Humming
Hmmm

If you don't have a date
Celebrate
Go out and sit on the lawn
And do nothing
'Cause it's just what you must do
Nobody does it anymore

No I don't believe in the wasting of time,
But I don't believe that I'm wasting mine

If you don't have a point to make
Don't sweat it
You'll make a sharp one being so kind
And I'd sure appreciate it
Everyone else's goal's to get big headed
Why should I follow that beat being that I'm
Better than fine

Sarah Palin's Greatest Hits

The very best of Sarah Palin. Yes I am contributing to the "media bias" against her, and happily so. And I love that people call it "bias" when the very stupid words are coming out of her mouth unedited.

Honestly, numerous other grievances aside, the biggest one of all has been her garish need to be in the limelight just after the election. She cost the GOP and John McCain quite a bit of their credibility among moderates/independents, and now rather than letting John McCain lose with dignity, she's completely eclipsed him by deliberating the issue of being the GOP candidate for 2012. Silly woman. She should read a few newspapers first!

Diamonds are a girl's best friend

Carolyn Hax is one of my favorite advice columnists because she's completely no-nonsense and hilarious, and a great writer. I think this whole business of giant rock engagement ring is not just about the engagement ring: it's about the 3-story mansion, the BMWs, the private schools, the Ivy Leagues.

Having grown up in an affluent suburb with parents who struggle with this conflict every day (my dad claims to be very modest but buys a big screen TV and a BMW at his leisure), I'm trying to figure out where I fit on the status-scale. I used to hate on designer clothes/fashionistas/food snobs, but now I'm surrounded by them, and seeing as that I am going to be a doctor, it will only get worse. Carolyn's last sentence will stay with me forever.


Washington Post

Dear Carolyn:

I know I'm a horrible person for admitting this, and feel free to throw flames at me, but I feel inadequate about my engagement ring. My mom never even had one, and I know huge blingy rings are just another product of the Wedding Industrial Complex that I so despise, but I just can't help feeling bad when I see my friends' giant rocks compared with my (very lovely, but smaller) ring. Part of it may be due to the fact that my friends already think my fiance is poor because he has a blue-collar job, even though he makes a decent living. How do I stop feeling jealous of others and putting so much importance on material possessions?

Carolyn writes:

"My friends already think my fiance is poor"! Wow.

Smaller rock, meet the hard place: your conflicted feelings about status. Even if your friends are hateful snobs, this sounds like your insecurity talking -- you gravitate to status-conscious friends, and then profess or parade that you've chosen humble things. Yes? As in, the rock didn't reject you, you rejected the rock?

It's a theory. If it has no merit, then this is probably all just bling envy. Admit you're impressed by opulence and leave it at that.

If the theory does have merit, next question: Is bringing a "blue-collar" fiance into your (apparently) white-collar world another ostentatious rejection of something you secretly value? If so, please make sure you're smitten with the person, not the statement he makes.

Oh Al-Qaeda, why so angry?

Why are there some unabashedly evil people in the world? Makes me sad. Al-Qaeda will try to find anything to keep the power of their influence alive.

REUTERS

Qaeda scorns Obama with racial slur
Thu Nov 20, 2008 12:13am EST

By Randall Mikkelsen

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's deputy leader accused Barack Obama of betraying his race and his father's Muslim heritage on Wednesday and urged more attacks, as the group tried to counter the incoming U.S. president's global popularity.

Osama bin Laden's second-in-command Ayman al Zawahri attacked Obama as a "house Negro," a racially-charged term used by 1960s black American Muslim leader Malcolm X to describe black slaves loyal to white masters.

"You represent the direct opposite of honorable black Americans like ... Malcolm X," Zawahri said in an 11-minute recording publicized on the Internet on Wednesday. It was al Qaeda's first high-level commentary on Obama's election on November 4. Bin Laden could also release a message on Obama within the next two weeks or so, one analyst said.

Zawahri criticized Obama's support for Israel and plans to send more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, where he said they were destined to fail. He urged Islamist fighters to keep striking a "criminal" United States until it withdraws from Muslim lands.

The recording was distributed on a videotape that carried pictures of Obama at the Western Wall in Jerusalem and Malcom X, flanking Zawahri in the center.

U.S. officials and analysts, alert for signs of an attack in the period leading up to the transfer of presidential power on January 20, said there was no sign of an imminent threat.

They cast Zawahri's message as an attempt to shift al Qaeda's focus from U.S. President George W. Bush and maintain an enmity against the United States among its supporters.

"They're faced with what is by any accounting a change in this country," said one U.S. counterterrorism official who asked not to be identified.

OBAMA BRINGING CHANGE

"The way they're dealing with the change represented by the election of an African American as president of the United States is to insist that nothing has changed," he said.

Obama's transition office declined to comment.

His election was greeted with broad hope in the Middle East, where U.S. relations with Arabic countries were deeply strained under Bush.

Daniel Benjamin, a counterterrorism official under former President Bill Clinton, said Obama's election on a platform of breaking with Bush policies was a boost to American "soft power," or nonmilitary international influence.

"I think they (al Qaeda) are deeply threatened by the fact there is a new American president and that he has come to office saying he wants to have a more constructive relationship with the one billion Muslims in the world."

Zawahri, he said, "feels like he has a competitor for the hearts and minds."

Zawahri referred to Obama's Kenyan father, who was raised Muslim but became an atheist. Obama is a Christian. "You were born to a Muslim father, but you chose to stand in the ranks of the enemies of the Muslims," Zawahri said.

The Malcolm X reference probably reflects the influence of American-born al Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn, believed to be close to Zawahri, said a U.S. terrorism monitor who goes by the pseudonym Laura Mansfield.

Zawahri has employed the "house Negro" insult before, when in 2007 he used it to label Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her predecessor, Colin Powell, who are both black.

"And in you and in Colin Powell, Rice and your likes, the words of Malcolm X ... concerning 'House Negroes' are confirmed," Zawahri said in the message released on Wednesday.

His spoken remarks could also be translated as "house slaves," but al Qaeda's accompanying English translation, distributed by the IntelCenter Web monitor, used "house Negroes."

Mansfield said it typically takes bin Laden, deep in hiding, longer than Zawahri to produce a statement reacting to events and relay it to an outlet. But it would not be a surprise if he released one soon, she said.

Me fail English! That's un-possible with Barack Obama as President!

It's been beaten to death, but it's true: America is facing another major culture war: The culture of terror versus the culture of thought. Nicholas Kristof cogently describes this below.


November 9, 2008
Op-Ed Columnist
Obama and the War on Brains
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Barack Obama’s election is a milestone in more than his pigmentation. The second most remarkable thing about his election is that American voters have just picked a president who is an open, out-of-the-closet, practicing intellectual.

Maybe, just maybe, the result will be a step away from the anti-intellectualism that has long been a strain in American life. Smart and educated leadership is no panacea, but we’ve seen recently that the converse — a White House that scorns expertise and shrugs at nuance — doesn’t get very far either.

We can’t solve our educational challenges when, according to polls, Americans are approximately as likely to believe in flying saucers as in evolution, and when one-fifth of Americans believe that the sun orbits the Earth.

Almost half of young Americans said in a 2006 poll that it was not necessary to know the locations of countries where important news was made. That must be a relief to Sarah Palin, who, according to Fox News, didn’t realize that Africa was a continent rather than a country.

Perhaps John Kennedy was the last president who was unapologetic about his intellect and about luring the best minds to his cabinet. More recently, we’ve had some smart and well-educated presidents who scrambled to hide it. Richard Nixon was a self-loathing intellectual, and Bill Clinton camouflaged a fulgent brain behind folksy Arkansas aphorisms about hogs.

As for President Bush, he adopted anti-intellectualism as administration policy, repeatedly rejecting expertise (from Middle East experts, climate scientists and reproductive health specialists). Mr. Bush is smart in the sense of remembering facts and faces, yet I can’t think of anybody I’ve ever interviewed who appeared so uninterested in ideas.

At least since Adlai Stevenson’s campaigns for the presidency in the 1950s, it’s been a disadvantage in American politics to seem too learned. Thoughtfulness is portrayed as wimpishness, and careful deliberation is for sissies. The social critic William Burroughs once bluntly declared that “intellectuals are deviants in the U.S.”

(It doesn’t help that intellectuals are often as full of themselves as of ideas. After one of Stevenson’s high-brow speeches, an admirer yelled out something like, You’ll have the vote of every thinking American! Stevenson is said to have shouted back: That’s not enough. I need a majority!)

Yet times may be changing. How else do we explain the election in 2008 of an Ivy League-educated law professor who has favorite philosophers and poets?

Granted, Mr. Obama may have been protected from accusations of excessive intelligence by his race. That distracted everyone, and as a black man he didn’t fit the stereotype of a pointy-head ivory tower elitist. But it may also be that President Bush has discredited superficiality.

An intellectual is a person interested in ideas and comfortable with complexity. Intellectuals read the classics, even when no one is looking, because they appreciate the lessons of Sophocles and Shakespeare that the world abounds in uncertainties and contradictions, and — President Bush, lend me your ears — that leaders self-destruct when they become too rigid and too intoxicated with the fumes of moral clarity.

(Intellectuals are for real. In contrast, a pedant is a supercilious show-off who drops references to Sophocles and masks his shallowness by using words like “fulgent” and “supercilious.”)

Mr. Obama, unlike most politicians near a microphone, exults in complexity. He doesn’t condescend or oversimplify nearly as much as politicians often do, and he speaks in paragraphs rather than sound bites. Global Language Monitor, which follows linguistic issues, reports that in the final debate, Mr. Obama spoke at a ninth-grade reading level, while John McCain spoke at a seventh-grade level.

As Mr. Obama prepares to take office, I wish I could say that smart people have a great record in power. They don’t. Just think of Emperor Nero, who was one of the most intellectual of ancient rulers — and who also killed his brother, his mother and his pregnant wife; then castrated and married a slave boy who resembled his wife; probably set fire to Rome; and turned Christians into human torches to light his gardens.

James Garfield could simultaneously write Greek with one hand and Latin with the other, Thomas Jefferson was a dazzling scholar and inventor, and John Adams typically carried a book of poetry. Yet all were outclassed by George Washington, who was among the least intellectual of our early presidents.

Yet as Mr. Obama goes to Washington, I’m hopeful that his fertile mind will set a new tone for our country. Maybe someday soon our leaders no longer will have to shuffle in shame when they’re caught with brains in their heads.