Monthly Archives: November 2018

Friends Forever

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I’m an introvert and a dreamer. As an introvert, I have a few close friends rather than a large circle of lukewarm friends. I think of my friends often, like to know them well, and consider them family. Being an introvert also means that I like to have a large dose of time alone. When I’m alone I daydream about the escapades I’ll go on throughout my life. As a dreamer, I think of solo quests and I hash out perfect adventures to go on which each of my friends, knowing every friend’s unique virtues and nature.

Each period of my life has given me one or several wonderful people to add to my friend family. These days, I’ve been thinking a lot about friendship–largely because I’ve stumbled upon some outstanding new friends. But, also, it’s been a long time since I’ve visit some of my friends who live far away; I’m thinking I might move in the next year; and I’m visiting Paraguay soon. Friends of my past, present, and future geographic locations are always on my mind.

Whenever I think about friendship, I remember a conversation I overheard 3 years ago. I’ve decided to repost (again, it’s not the first time) because it’s my favorite description of what true friendship is. While not everyone believes in Heaven, I think the lesson this scene teaches is universally applicable.  

Overheard in Paraguay: Friendship
Repost from October 19, 2015

We sat in a half circle around the grill. The men were cooking large slabs of meat (ribs and some unidentifiable cut) for the mother of the family’s birthday dinner. The husband of one of the birthday mother’s daughters sat by the grill passing one can of beer among the men there. A nephew walked up to the daughter’s husband. The husband was around 30 and the nephew was about 11.

The husband hugged his nephew first with one arm and then the other, squeezing him. The nephew squirmed, and they both smiled. The husband held the nephew at arm’s length and put on an almost serious expression. “Will we always be friends?” the husband asked.

“Yes,” the nephew said.

“Even when I am old and you are my age?” the husband asked.

“Yes, even when you are old and I have kids,” the nephew said.

The husband smiled and pulled the nephew into another hug. The nephew pulled away again and they looked at each other, the husband still squeezed the nephew’s shoulder with one hand.

“Even when you are in Heaven and I am old we will still be friends,” the nephew said earnestly.

The husband laughed. “And I will look after you from Heaven.” They hugged again. “And, when you come to Heaven, we will be friends in Heaven. We will be friends forever.”

The boy nodded and ran off to find his playmates.

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Countdown to Visiting Paraguay

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It’s been 2 years since I last stepped foot in Paraguay, that little country at the heart of South America where I lived for 27 months as a Peace Corps volunteer. But, I’m going there for 2 weeks this December. It’ll be the second time I’ve gone back to visit since returning to the US.

I find myself falling into a reflective mood as I think about the long journey south. My trip comes at the best time, when snow and cold have descended on Vermont. I need a break from winter even though it’s only just arrived. I’m reflective because I’m a very different person than the one who left Paraguay almost 3 years ago. I won’t bore you with the details of thrusting myself into pre-medicine and the whirlwind of building a new life in Vermont, both adventures that have consumed my time since I moved back to the States. What I will say, however, is that I’m excited to see the red dirt of Paraguay again. I look forward to their fatty foods. And most of all, I can’t wait to sit with the Paraguayans I call my family and friends and discuss the weather and life…and crack jokes. Often, the jokes are about my singleness or professional focus (aspects of my being that are particularly distinct from the Paraguayan way of life) but not always.

Many of the kids I taught in Paraguay have graduated or are soon to graduate high school. I see their Facebook photos of college study and adult life. Many of them have lost parents to illness. Some of those parents I knew and spoke to on my almost daily walks to the school. Many of my students have their own babies now. Few are married yet.

Some of the elderly women I used to spend the afternoons with have passed away since I last visited. Others, I’m not sure if they’re alive because they don’t have cell phones. What I know is that the señoras in my Paraguayan community will welcome me into their homes with just as many smiles and just as much generosity as they did when I was their neighbor. Those women took me in as their daughter. I think they were always torn about what kind of daughter was. On one hand, I didn’t know anything about the right way to navigate life in Paraguay, but, on the other hand, I knew how to travel from my country to theirs and I have so many dreams and goals.

In many ways life in Paraguay is the same as here. But, as I think about going back I’m also reminded by just how difference it is. The food and smells—meat and real animal fat mix with the smell of live chickens, pigs, and cows who idle close to the houses. The topics of conversation vary, but there is something unique about the gossip of families who have lived by one another for so many generations no one remembers any other place they called home. They speak in a mix of Spanish and Guarani (the indigenous language); the sounds of those languages together bring back many memories of the best two, but also the hardest two, years of my life so far. The soundtrack of Paraguay is different—the rhythms of bachata, polka, cumbia, and reggaeton fill the air on hazy, hot weekend days and weekday nights.

In many ways, Paraguay has the indomitable nature of never outwardly changing in any significant way, just like my home state of Vermont. But, just as Vermont, there are the subtle differences of life moving forward. One of my dearest friends has returned to law school (she’s already a lawyer) for a specialty degree and she is now a mother—both new accomplishments since I last saw her. Another friend finished his military training and now works for the Paraguayan Navy—he still visits his family’s home whenever he gets a stretch of days free from duty. Another friend started a local clothing store. All of us are older than we once were. The babies I knew when I lived in Paraguay are now children. The children are almost adults.

As I drink my daily mate alone in Vermont, I often think about my Paraguayan friends. I miss them every day. I miss them because no other people I’ve encountered is so good at sharing time with each other. So good at making you feel welcomed and loved. Their culture has built in values and rituals that allow friends and family to sit together and share a drink or a meal without any other obligation. I miss my Paraguayan families because they are so good at seeing the bright side of everything. So good at ignoring the bad things that happen, almost to a fault.

The nostalgia I feel for Paraguay is one where all the bad aspects of living there are forgotten and I remember only the good. Of course, both the light and dark sides of Paraguayan life will confront me when I land again in that country…but somehow that doesn’t bother me.

I remember the first time I flew to Paraguay, not knowing what awaited me there. It was exciting and petrifying. This time when I go back, I know the communities and families who will greet me again with open arms. I can’t wait to see them. I can’t wait to eat chipa and sip terere in the shade of tropical trees because it is absolutely too hot to do anything else. I can’t wait to walk around my old community and say “hi” to every human I pass because that’s the Paraguayan way. I can’t wait to be reminded there is more than one way to live life, none better or worse than the other, just different.

5 Things I’m Grateful for this Holiday Season

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This was a big year for me. I finished my pre-medical classes, took the MCAT, applied to medical school, and then I got into medical school. My youngest brother graduated college. My grandfather was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. I got a new job in the emergency department where I get to spend most of my day caring for patients. One of my dear friends had her first baby, and I’ll get to meet him this December (because I’m visiting my beloved Paraguay!!).

The laundry list above is just a sampling of the year. I’ve also made some great new friends, met some amazing people, done a tiny bit of national travel, and spent good hours learning new things. I could fill pages about the year, but I won’t just now. Instead, as the holidays approach, here are 5 things for which I am grateful:

1) My family who made it possible for me to get into medical school. They’ve listen to me gripe. Told me to stop whining and act. Shared my excitement for small victories. They’ve cooked, visited, hosted, taken me out to dinner, pitched in when I was in a pinch, made me laugh, talked me off the edge of tears, and helped me keep going when I wasn’t sure if going was an option.

2) The friends who stay in touch even though we live lightyears apart in separate, though equally chaotic, universes. The new friends who have joined me in sweating over biochemistry, hiking through Vermont’s woods, undertaking food adventures, and soaking in the quiet moments of life. The hardest part about moving as much as I have is that many of my favorite humans live far away. It’s a testament to their greatness that despite our distance they remain a positive force in my life.

3) The folks at my new job who reminded me what being part of a good team feels like. Who taught me the tricks of a new trade. Who show up every shift ready to do what needs to be done and between saving lives have energy for a smile or laugh.

4) The mentors and teachers who taught me all I know about medicine and science. But, also, my life mentors—the ones who have been there since undergrad (or before), the ones who’ve shown me the ropes of being an EMT, and the ones who set an example of what kind of old person I aspire to be.

5) Vermont. Sometimes my little home state is cold (actually, it’s usually cold). Sometimes Vermont is too homogenous and too isolated to quench my love of the new. But, this year, I’ve basked in perfect summer days where the sun is just right. I’ve soaked in the smells and silence of the forest and absorbed the wind that makes waves on Lake Champlain. I’ve reflected on the mountains that guard the horizon. I’ve enjoyed creemees, apple orchards, and maple syrup. I’ve watched the rain fall with mate in hand. I’m from Vermont. And while I don’t often call Vermont my home, it is the place where my roots have always been and always will be.

I’m grateful for the moments I’ve had to enjoy all the people and places that make life worth the sweat. I’m thinking about those moments as the holidays approach.

Marathon Goals

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I remember the conversation I had with my best friend that sealed my desire to become a doctor. We were in our relatively new apartment, in the living room that was an extension of the kitchen. The city sun of Washington, DC filtered in the large windows and onto the bedraggled plants we had lined along the window sills. I’d been contemplating the idea of entering medicine for months. The thought came to me shortly after I started working in health communications. What I liked most about health communications was the medical research, knowledge of life, and opportunities to interact with people. I wanted to find a way to fill my days with those things rather than dabble in them. My friend worked in a primary care office, on the administrative side. She encouraged me as I talked about possibly switching careers. “You’d be a good doctor,” she said. Thus, began my marathon goal to become a doctor, a process I call “the doctorhood quest.”

That conversation was 5 years ago. Recently, what started as a thought became a real possibility. I’ve been accepted to medical school. There’s still the question of financing and survival, but with an acceptance to school, there is hope that the rest of the journey will fall into place. I will be a doctor.

Marathon goals. I’ve always been a planner and as a runner I prefer long distance. But, there is something uniquely challenging about making goals that will take over a decade to accomplish. There is no way to know the future, and absolutely no way to predict a future as distant as 10 years from now. But, somehow, the uncertainty and hidden challenges that the doctorhood quest presents have not deterred me. I reflected on the prospect of doctorhood during my years of Peace Corps service and, once back in the States, I started jumping through the hoops of medical school applications (I had no science background when I began). The long wait to medical school acceptance has only made me more excited to start my studies. The doctorhood quest isn’t even half over—medical school, residency, and board exams will be the longer leg of the journey. Yet, as I sit on an acceptance letter and wait to hear back from more schools, it’s thrilling that I’ve come this far.

People around me, to me or to others, often comment on how intelligent one must be to get into medical school. I usually remain silent, but smirk inwardly. I believe “smart” comes in many forms and not all are suited to medicine. I’m disinclined to suggest one person is smarter than another because life has shown me that humans have different gifts and society needs all of them to function. But, more specifically, my journey has shown me that medical school admittance has less to do with how smart someone is and more to do with how resilient they are. The doctorhood quest requires you to be gritty and determined. It demands that you jump up and try again each time you fall while tackling the perils of the road.

If resiliency and grit is the secret to pursuing marathon goals without losing hope, how does one get those? Experience and inward reflection are my guesses. We learn by doing and we expand our scope of understanding the more different experiences we have. Nothing proved this more to me than my years in Paraguay. I am not the same person I was when I first stepped off the plane in that hot, humid country. The people there showed me how they found happiness; they defined respect and God and love in ways completely different from any definition I’d ever encountered for those things; and, above all, they exposed me to foods, ways of life, and shared moments I could never have imagined.

Experience is the foundation for growth, but to truly grow one must reflect on those experiences. Paraguay, once again, taught me reflection. It is impossible to describe just how lonely and hard it can be to be the only one from your culture in a foreign place unless you’ve experienced it. Your world is turned upside-down and every definition and rule you ever thought was a given is no longer in play. Your default becomes mild confusion and curiosity about the new culture in which you have fallen. Most importantly, you are forced to examine how your culture does things and why. Once you start picking apart your host and native cultures, it’s an easy, logical jump to start evaluating and thinking about different aspects of your personal life—like your interactions, feelings, and activity choices. Once you build in time to reflect on experience you can start to shape your path more purposefully.

The secret to marathon goals is accepting you can’t know the future, but you can influence the present. The secret is celebrating small victories, making educated guesses about the best course of action today, and seeking out the people, places, and experiences that rejuvenate you when your hope falters. We do not achieve marathon goals alone (it takes many helpers) but it is only from within ourselves that we find the strength to withstand what’s hidden behind each bend in the road.

Go Vote on November 6

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Elections are November 6. That’s a few days from now. If you haven’t registered, there’s still time. There’s also time to figure out where to go to vote. There’s time to review the candidates and pick which ones you want to lead us. Now’s the time.

Recently, a friend shrugged when I encouraged her to register to vote and fit a trip to the polls into her busy Tuesday. Elections are this Tuesday, November 6, 2018. “I haven’t been affected by the current president,” she said.

“Are you sure?” I asked. I wondered how she hadn’t noticed the ways in which our leaders’ decisions were posed to shape American lives for generations. I wondered when we thought the only person we voted for was the president. I wondered about the apathy of the masses. I wondered when we had forgotten how much politics matter.

We don’t only vote for the president. We vote for the school budget and those who decide how our towns and cities and states should be run. We vote for congress men and women every 2 years and we vote for senators every 6 years…and those two groups make up the Legislative Branch. The Legislative Branch is important because it’s a counterweight, a check and a balance, to the Executive Branch (the president) and the Judicial Branch (the judges, picked by the president on the national level).

US democracy only works if you care about all 3 governmental branches because the 3 keep each other in check. US democracy only works if you care about federal, state, and local politics because they work with and against each other in a constant tug-of-war between different beliefs. When one fraction of the government is ignored by most voters, the voices of a few predominate, and those vocal individuals then make decisions for other people whose lives they don’t understand.

But, let me stop ranting. I have a few points that are more concise. A few issues to keep in mind. A few things I remember when elections come.

  • What’s the price of gas these days? Did you know tariffs and trade agreements made by our politicians can lower the price of gas for the period leading up to elections?
  • What is your voting district? Did you know district borders are drawn by politicians? The lines are often drawn to ensure the current party always wins.
  • How do you feel about access to health care? For the elderly? For the poor? For those who have pre-existing conditions (those who are already sick)? Access to and education about birth control? Your politicians decide how hard it is to see a doctor and get the medications you need to feel well.
  • What is love? Who are you allowed to marry? Who gets legal rights to visit a loved one as they lie dying in a hospital? Who can adopt children? Your politicians decide.
  • Who’s protected by civil rights laws? Your politicians get to set legal definitions of things like gender, sex, and race. Did you know children used to not have protection under the law? They had fewer rights than animals. Politicians changed that—with pressure from lobbyists and people who thought it was wrong to beat children or make children work.
  • Where and when do we go to war? How to we care for veterans? Who do we allow to join the armed forces? Your politicians set those guidelines. What are we doing in Iraq and Afghanistan now? What are American soldiers doing in Syria? Are we going to attack Russia or China? It’s your government that makes those decisions.
  • Are billboards allowed? Billboards are illegal in Vermont, thanks to local politics. Vermont depends on tourism…so were billboards banned for economic reasons or was it because some politicians thought billboards were ugly?

The above are just the beginning. There are so many other things that depend on politics. The price of food, for example. The minimum wage. Life is a complex web. Claim: our immigration policies influence the price of oranges…can you puzzle out why?

The thing about politics is that it permeates life in subtle ways. In the US, we are lucky because political decisions don’t often lead to obvious shortages of essentials or the disappearance of dissenters (we don’t have camps where we hold people prisoner, or do we?). It’s naïve to believe that everything from our wallets to privacy or marriage to jail terms are not shaped by the decisions our legislators, judges, and political leaders make.

My point is simply that your opinion matters. Make yourself heard and go vote. Take part in democracy. Be a citizen of the US and go vote. Go vote because it’s what you should do. Go vote because it’s what others are doing. Go vote because you can. Go vote because your country needs you to vote. Go vote.