School starts tomorrow.
I’ve built this up in my head enough that I’m expecting to bomb the first semester. Our prof told us at orientation to read the first two chapters of the book before the first class and do the associated problems — which seemed fine, until I got to the end of chapter 1 (after doing the in-text problems) and found 155 ‘additional practice’ problems. “These? All of these?”
I commiserated with a classmate. Neither of us were sure if these were included in the pre-work. The “oh crumbs” was palpable in the air.
Last night I got an email from the prof reiterating the prework…which only included Ch1 and the in-text problems embedded in the chapter.
So now I am ahead, being finished with Ch1, and nearly finished with Ch2. It looks like our first exam is Ch1-3, so I am feeling like I’m in pretty good shape.
Comparing this to medic school, I feel a lot less urgency in the material; while it’s foundational and for sure there’ll be mistakes I need to correct and rework, no one is going to die if I mix up Lavoisier and Dalton. So there is the pressure of “I need to nail this, because two semesters (and roughly 14 weeks) from now, I’m going to be doing stuff that’s a lot harder and depends on knowing this stuff” but it’s more of an existential dread than a very present one.
Medic school was hard because:
- it was high-pressure life-or-death material
- while going to class 4x a week
- while working 3 jobs
- during which I was laid off from my FT job
- and split from my partner of 6 years
- and had to find a new apt
- losing my closest friend in the process
- (lessons were learned; don’t try to lean all-in on a friendship when you know you’re objectively acting like a terrible human being from the stressors your under)
- while low-key endemic bullying was going on
- which mostly only affected me second-hand (cleaning up fallout/providing support) until right at the end of the program
As a side note: don’t be the person that blows off steam tearing other people down. Gossip about Game of Thrones or whatever TV ends up being hot this next season or how the heck are gaucho pants back in fashion or something else, just…what you do has a huge effect, and the ripples from that spread farther than you think.
I like to believe that this time around will be less tumultuous; and it’s much more long-haul, which while a little “here-we-go-what-have-I-done” is also profoundly exciting. I am viscerally aware of the work and the time I have lying ahead of me, and there is delight in it.
Oh yeah, and I’m going to learn how to do 5 pull-ups. Can’t do any right now, but hold my beer.
Book and Ladder 
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