remusisdying

gave tours to alumni today. old people (and old docs) fucking rock. i also got some free food and free umbrella (i believe it is a 'golf umbrella' bc its absurdly large). it was cool to meet a lot of alumni who feel that what im going through is actually worth it. also, the class of 1980 has six or so people give presentations on what they had done since graduating, and present some aspects of medicine they felt were particularly important. its the kind of thing that more of my class should have seen, but it was just me and one other. one guy became a vegan advocate, one woman spent a bunch of time at hms as a lab researcher and just recently started to explore the concepts of life and death in 'doomed' neonatal infants. definitely some cool shit. it was also interesting to hear from the guy who did his residency at the brigham and women's hospital, and who said the best day of his life was the day he left hms.
im starting to seriously consider what it is that i want out of this whole thing. i feel that i continually get enticed by academic medicine here, and thats something i think i might not want (at least not to the most extreme). i went into this thing both for me and for patients, and i dont know how much work i can do in the lab that will directly benefit people. i wish it was enough for me to work on esoteric projects that might abstractly help improve patient care, but it really isnt. ah well. out for the night with a group to grab a beer after a busy day of anatomy and physical diagnosis and alumni, etc.