This coffee mug says every thing I need to say most of the time.
My new trunk works great as a makeshift coffee table/desk. (Thanks for getting it and sending it to me Mom!)
I really do sound like I am from Texas. Apparently I say “Y’all” and “I’m fix in’ to…”
The Northeast is colder than I ever imagined. People keep telling me how mild this winter has been and I kinda want to hit them.
Getting packages from home is the best. It reminds me how much my family and friends support me and love me. Plus, it eases the loneliness of being so far away.
I appreciate the opportunity to learn. I geek out when I am given new information. This may be one reason this job was such a good idea. I seem to be surrounded by teachers.
I learn new stuff every day! I have a new appreciation for there being more than one right way to do something. Just because it is not my way, does not mean it is the wrong way.
Going back to gym after such a long hiatus is incredibly difficult. You forget how much the first workout hurts. Even if it was not balls to the walls.
Keeping all the new names and faces straight is hard enough. Now let me figure out how to navigate this hospital. I will keep getting lost until I don’t.
I can be confident in my abilities. One of my greatest strengths is tenacity. I don’t have to be afraid.
I can be myself and still be nice.
I do not have to be the funniest or most clever person in the room. That just makes you appear insecure.
Shane at the UPS store in Lubbock was exceptionally helpful today. I should send an email. He deserves recognition.
You can take the girl out of Texas, but you are never taking Texas out of the girl.
I am learning so much, mostly because I know so little. Some people are hesitant to admit their ignorance about certain topics, I am not. It’s embarrassing, sometimes.
I have never lived somewhere with a radiator. In Texas, central heat and air reigns supreme. The radiator makes strange noises in the night, if I did not know better, I would be nervous.
Working on a surgical service is completely different than working on a medicine service. I always knew this was true, but I never really knew the surgery side of things.
Not all residents are douchebags. You would think I would have already learned this, however most of my experience with residents has been minimal exposure. The residents I am working with are nice and quite willing to make me feel welcome. I don’t feel like they are waiting for opportunities to make me feel inadequate. This is truly a welcoming learning environment.
Physicians are not all natural teachers, however once you express interest in their passions they will stop and spend some time explaining their expertise to you.
I am having fun. I am exhausted by all the new ideas.
I am still a newbie and I have a lot to learn. So excited!
I know I am late to the party. For some reason I had never seen this movie. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.
Now, I am not going to get into semantics about the movie, I just want to talk a little about how it influenced me. We all know I am rather self-absorbed and the most important part of anything is how it all influences me.
Daddy Issues
The biggest question bothering me as I watched the movie centers on the girl, who is looking for her father. Are we all constantly seeking a dad? Are men slaves to this as well? I am usually quite sensitive to this topic in literature and movies which leaves me wondering if this is simply due to my lack of a father. Do people with good fathers have this issue? I found myself thinking David Morse was cast perfectly as the doting paternal figure. Then he died. Sigh.
There was a small part of me wishing she actually found a way to communicate with her father. Then, he made certain she understood he was just a hallucination. Once again there are no answers about whether or not our “souls” continue to exist after we die. Come on Sagan, throw me a bone! I found myself wondering if she felt closure after she saw her “father.”
My father is not dead. At least not as far as I know. I don’t imagine I would get any relief or closure if I saw him again. I think it would be more of the same bullheadedness that I inherited from him. While I cannot imagine completely turning your back on your child, I also know there is something so irrevocably damaged he simply lost capacity for maintaining a relationship with me. I am okay with this. Even if it still sucks sometimes.
Love Interests!
Look, this was NOT Matthew McConaughey’s finest hour. He was quite flat throughout the movie. So, while I am acknowledging the fact he was not my kind of dude, he did something I love. The whole compass thing. Come on! I know it is cheesy. I have had secret fantasy for years about a guy giving me a compass. Tom Hanks did it in Big! It is seriously the sweetest gesture to me. So, Mr. Right if you want to win my heart, all you need to do is give me a compass and say something incredibly charming about wanting me to always find my way home to you.
This would serve two purposes. First, it would indicate you pay attention to the cheesy, sappy crap I pretend I don’t like. Second, it would show you have been reading my blog, AND paid attention. You would win all the way around. There is absolutely no downside to presenting me with a compass.
Theology and Terrorists
This movie did a fairly good job of highlighting the struggles people in this country face when they are not religious. Her lack of faith almost prevented her from being the person who got to go on the grand adventure. The only thing I know is I value religious freedom. This includes the right to not have a religion and not be persecuted.
The bomber was relevant even for almost 20 years later. We are still using bombs and weapons to attempt to prove theological points. I still find it disgusting. I cannot wrap my head around how people get from “I want to save lives” to “I need to kill you.” Pro-lifers shooting doctors. Muslims shooting up Christmas parties. Strange dudes opening fire in a bible study. I lump all of these people into one big group. Anyone who fixates on some ideology and uses it to justify hate and murder is just a douchebag. I have tried to convince myself they are mentally ill, however I just don’t buy it.
Love Letter to Science and Progress
In the end I suppose the story is really a love letter to science as a tool to achieve progress. I loved the point about taking small steps and evolving through it. This is an important lesson for me. I find myself wanting to rush through every thing to get to the end point. Perhaps I need to relish the small steps I continue to make.
There is something beautiful in the little victories.
As a species, I feel like humans have a gift of curiosity. This eternal drive for knowledge and answers. We would cease to have ambition if we had all the answers handed to us. I will never run out of questions. This means I will have to wake up and not be excited about what I may learn that day. We cannot stop looking for solutions just because our first attempt failed. We have to continue on.
Stop using real footage out of context
Robert Zemeckis did a pretty good job on this movie. I did not like all the news coverage and CNN footage. It seemed jarring. It was cute when he did it in Forrest Gump, but he needs to find a new trick. Rather than making the movie seem more likely to be possible, I was distracted trying to remember what Bill Clinton was actually talking about in that clip. I did not like it.
Jodie Foster.
I related to Ellie as she went through her journey, and Jodie Foster somehow manages to suck me in with her understated charm and quiet demeanor. She manages to play strong women without making them overbearing. This is a skill I wish I possessed.
I am always uncomfortable when she is dealing with some romantic entanglement. Why is it always so awkward?
Pleasantly Surprised
Contact was worth the time I spent watching it. While there were not many answers, it left me satisfied. I really don’t know how I managed to never see it until now.
A friend of mine posted this on Facebook tonight. It seemed remarkably appropriate for my current situation. Well, except no princes have been proposing to me lately, however that is hardly the point.
I hear women call themselves survivors frequently. I have had that term draped around my neck a time or two myself. I realized today I don’t want to be a survivor. I don’t want to simply survive my life. I want to thrive. I want to find new adventures and challenges. I don’t need to be rescued.
Too often we allow the baggage of our past to drag us down. We find ourselves swimming against the current and fighting our own progress. Sometimes it is best to simply relax and see where the river’s flow will take us.
I refuse to be a captive to the little voice in my head telling me I can’t succeed. I refuse to settle and fail to accomplish my goals to the absolute best of my ability. I won’t be a victim to my thinking or anyone else’s actions.
I have already achieved so much more than I ever believed I would. There is no indication I am going to be a failure. I deserve to give myself a break.
Survival is about living with the past. I am going to do well despite the past. I can do anything I want to do.
Some people say they are fighters. I don’t want to fight. That is painful and violent. I am going to live my life with an open mind and an open heart. I am not a fighter.
I may as well admit it, I have a thinking problem.
I continue to over analyze and obsess over every thing that pops into my head. I think it is because I am back to waiting to see when I am going to my new job. Waiting for licensure and credentialing to be completed is agonizing.
I hate waiting.
While I wait, I ruminate.
Agonize.
Worry.
Daydream.
Wonder.
Plot.
Anticipate.
When is all of this angst ever productive? In my experience, never. So, why do I continue to make myself crazy? I think it may be habit. I refuse to be one of those people who rush into decisions without having thought it all the way through. People who rush into things drive me crazy. Life decisions should be carefully considered.
My anxiety about making decisions is often misguided and borders on ridiculous. By the time I am done going over my options I no longer care which option I choose. I almost always have immediate buyer’s remorse. I should have gotten the other one. I also do the thing where I can’t decide between two options and I either get both, or neither. I have to tell sales people to stay away from me when I am making large purchases. If they are over there prattling on about the features and differences between two options, I get overwhelmed and change my mind. It is really a little embarrassing.
Big life decisions about where I want to work or live are often better left to chance. I do better if I am well-informed, but then when I am going about making the choice I try to see what works out best. The problem with this attitude is I am running the risk of making a choice because it is logistically simpler. Sometimes it is because there is less paperwork involved. I hate paperwork. I don’t like signing stuff and I REALLY don’t like signing stuff again.
I am trying to learn how to back off and relax while still evaluating decisions objectively. I am still trying to figure what characteristics are paramount and which are simply preferences. Location and money are important factors but not as desirable as an excellent learning opportunity. I have not figured out a scale to measure and evaluate decision yet. I think assigning traits a weight would help more than a simple pro and con checklist. What about things that are both pro and con? How do you measure which side wins?
I even manage to get weighed down with the decision to make a decision. It is somewhat ludicrous. Here I am trying to ascertain the proper method for ascertaining what I want out of life. I am actually starting to believe the most important skill of highly successful people must be the ability to decide and follow through with their decision. Where do you learn that skill?
So, where is the delineation between purposeful consideration and needless obsession? How does one go about making a decision and standing behind it with confidence?
Most importantly: How on earth do you make your brain turn off for a little while so you can get some sleep?
Stolen from pinterestAs I scroll through my Facebook news feed, I am inundated with happy couples.
“She said Yes!”
“Happy Anniversary to the love of my life…”
“I have the best boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife…”
“I love you Baby.”
Blah, blah, blah, blah. It’s not that I am unhappy for these adorably sickenly sweet couples, I just don’t get it. I am not there. I am not feeling all those cotton candy rainbows and butterflies.
I am the single friend. The perpetual third, fifth or sometimes even seventh wheel on any adventure. My friends are all fantastic about including me and I have to be honest, their husbands are exceedingly kind and never treat me like they wish I were not there. They are my friends!
Most of the time I am not even bothered by my singledom. Believe me, I would rather be single than be in a relationship that does not work. No, thank you very much. Then there are those moments that sneak up on you and catch you completely off guard. You find yourself wondering what on earth you are doing wrong.
Maybe I should try Tinder again. Maybe I should start texting all those people I used to “date.” (We use that term loosely in these parts.) I can’t believe so-and-so is getting married. WHAT?!? Look at that! He went back to her?
These thoughts are fleeting. Once I get through the initial barrage of disbelief I am happy for the couple. Well, unless I am thinking less than generous thoughts. “I bet they get divorced in six months.” or “She is only marrying him because she wants a baby.” These thoughts leave me feeling mean and I don’t like them. I try to suppress those thoughts and stop thinking about it all so negatively.
Why, if I am so happy for these people, do I find myself a little angsty, defensive, and judgmental?
Perhaps it is related to the feelings of inadequacy I experience when I evaluate my life. I have been told by society I should want to be married, have 2.4 children, a dog, and a house in the suburbs by this time in my life. When I evaluate my life on these terms I am failing miserably.
Who says I have to use this yardstick to grade my choices?
When I take a step back and honestly evaluate where I am in my life, I am doing pretty good.
I am reasonably successful professionally. My relationship with my family and friends is strong. I pretty much have the ability to go and see anything I want to experience. I have a great relationship with my only child. New opportunities are pouring out of the woodwork in both my professional and personal life. I get to go on adventures whenever I want to. I have phenomenal mentors who continue to support me as I grow and experience new things.
The only piece of the puzzle missing is a significant other. I forgot to fall in love somewhere along the way. Oops. My bad. At this point in my life, I am not even sure how a relationship would fit in. I am busy traveling and planning my next move. I am not interested in having an external influence to my choices at the present time. (Obviously, aside from my family.) I am going out and seeing what I like and essentially deciding who I want to be. What kind of life do I want to live?
Yes, sometimes I get a little lonely. We are programmed to want someone warm to cuddle with sometimes. (Euphemisms abound. Remember, my granddaddy reads this blog.) Seriously though, I am happy. I am not Desperately Seeking Anyone. At this point in my life, he would have to be amazing. I cannot even fathom what this man would be like. I try to envision what I think would make me happy, and I fail.
So, despite my snarky feelings about *your happiness, I am perfectly blissfully unattached.
*Obviously, not you, this was intended for people other than you. I love you and only want the best for you.
If you want to see more emo heart pics… I stole this one from Pinterest.
I am so tired of all the fighting. I do not understand any of the things happening around the world. I do not understand the things happening in my country either. There is too much hate in the world.
I want to live in a world where people:
are tolerant
build each other up instead of tearing each other down
celebrate unique differences instead of spreading hate
look after one another
care for their communities
are curious about the world around them
strive to be better than they were yesterday
encourage love and understanding
forge relationships instead of waging wars
help each other
encourage others to be self sufficient
forgive others for their mistakes
build teams instead of armies
work together for the common good
celebrate each other’s successes
promote honest and open communication
care about whether or not others have food and shelter
I am sickened by the actions of humanity right now. We are so busy judging and hating we are unable to see how we are all the same. It breaks my heart. What good is going to come of all this terror and turmoil? I do not know what the answer is, however it seems rather simple… just stop being assholes. Don’t blow people up. Stop committing genocide. Stop promoting fear and distrust of others.
I feel guilty for being safe and happy. I feel guilty for feeling gratitude for my son’s safety. He has a warm bed and plenty of food to eat. I do not know the answer. I do not know how to help the world be a different place. Why are there people who prefer hatred and violence over love and peace? Seriously, it makes no sense.
We are fighting over ideals and imaginary laws. Somehow we have been blinded to the most important truth; we are all human beings. You would think this would be a firm enough foundation for forming new relationships. We should be working toward a common goal.
Maybe I am naive, but I really just want things to be better. I don’t want to be afraid. I don’t want anyone to be afraid. I just want everyone to meet their potential and to be safe from violence.
Time heals all wounds. I have heard this saying my entire life. I don’t actually think this is the case. The benefit time affords us is distraction. The healing is an active process. It may not be a conscious or purposeful act, but under the surface scar tissue is being formed.
I have been experiencing dramatic changes over the past year or so, most of them beyond my volition. In fact, I have fought against them with grit and desperation. I have had important relationships changed and sometimes dissolve, I have left my steady career, and I have started living the life of a traveller. I have struggled through attempts at regaining personal health and wellness. My entire life has turned upside down and inside out. Nothing is the same as it used to be.
Isn’t that what life is though? If we had to wake up and live the same day over and over again the monotony would be maddening. Change is a wonderful byproduct of experience. I want to believe I have been growing as a person, and the person I am becoming is a better version of me. I am not sure I can compare this me to the old me. I can say beyond question I am DIFFERENT. I have changed.
I am a little quieter. I have more empathy. I try harder to be diplomatic. I am branching out and learning about new things. I actively seek adventure. These improvements don’t underscore the fact that change is hard. It hurts. Sometimes it is debilitating.
I do not regret any of the choices I have made. Yes, I am scared of the unknown. I get nervous when I think about driving across the country to spend six months working in a specialty that has always been a bit of a mystery to me. The thought of snow (lots of snow) makes me wonder if I can handle driving in the winter wonderland of the Northeast. I am afraid I will look foolish and not know what I am doing.
It has taken me months to heal some of the heartache that came with leaving my job. I do still get to work there sometimes when I am at home, and that does help. Healing has not been easy. Some days the wounds were angry, red, oozing welts of bitterness and regret. Now, I can look at the wounds and remember they are there, but healed over nicely. Most of the time I don’t even notice the scars.
The changes in relationships have been a bit harder. These were deeply personal and painful breaks. Then I took a step back. Perhaps it was just change. Long distance friendships are hard to maintain under the best circumstances. Now, throw both people into their own private turmoil. Neither one has the ability to tell the other what they need, much less provide for those needs. Unfortunately, this could spell the end of an era. Maybe it will all work out in the end. I like to think so.
So, I guess the point is change is inevitable. It may leave you with wounds that need to be healed, but in the end it is all just progress. Today, I am content with where I am. I know I am on a grand adventure. I need to remember to enjoy the ride.
I wish I had the words to say something really profound and original about the attacks on Paris. I don’t though. I must admit I am pretty much ignorant about the history of the middle east and how these groups got started. I am not here to put forth an opinion on those issues. I just want to talk about how I feel about all of this.
I do not understand how people can MURDER innocent victims in the name of a god and the afterlife. I do not understand how parents of daughters can want their children to grow up to be subservient. I am unable to fathom how people teach their children to hate in the name of God.
I am confounded by all of this.
Terrorism… just sucks. I don’t understand it. I guess I am rather sheltered here. My thoughts are with all the victims of violence, especially those in Paris. I cannot imagine how scary that must have been. I really wish this would just stop. Is Peace too much to ask for?
You probably should prepare yourself. This post is not about you. Unless it is. I’m not telling.
You know what really pisses me off? People misrepresenting themselves. Grown men who cannot take responsibility and act like adults. People who lie. Weasels who try to sabotage other’s lives. Old meddlesome people who take it upon themselves to cast judgment on others without knowing the real story. Middle aged women who take offense when you don’t go along with their plans. People who have the audacity to ignore common sense and to say “We have always done it that way.” Young men who take advantage of people and use them, with absolutely no regard or appreciation.
Why do people lose all sense of rationality when dealing with others? When exactly did it become okay to be an asshat? I get it, you are probably thinking “But Nyki you are an asshat sometimes.” Perhaps. It is rarely on purpose and I have been working on it for a while now. I spend a lot of time just trying to be quiet and to remember to act, not react.
I am fiercely protective of my family, friends, and patients. Don’t mess with them. Don’t tell people things you do not mean. If you cannot be man enough to be honest you need to stay away from the people I love. I have zero tolerance for abuse and cruelty. More importantly, I hate drama. I want people in my life who are not afraid to say it like it is.
It is probably a good thing I am single. I am notoriously bad at relationships. I tend to need a lot of alone time. I like to ponder random things. I can’t do that if someone is constantly jabbering in my ear. I don’t know how to relax in the company of other people. It takes vigilance for me. Which is counterproductive in the whole relaxing department. Oh, damn. I got distracted. More on this later.
Just know. This post is not about you. Unless it is. If you are so vain to think it is about you, it would probably be a good idea to just go. We don’t want you around anyway.
The Accidental Boxer 