Mad Skool Gradumacation

I never really consider myself to be superstitious, but I am one of those people who tends to view bad events in a particular way. I tend to have famously bad and good luck, by which I mean that a bad event will happen in a spectacularly melodramatic way, and then resolve itself in a similarly spectacular way that nobody else could reasonably expect. (Examples include $500 cash stolen from me at the Citibank and then retrieved and returned by NYPD in less than 48 hours, as well as losing all my keys on Wall Street in a giant crowd, and then having a Planet Fitness Jamaica employee message me on Facebook to say he'd found them.) This sort of reliable cycle of bad luck has now forced me into believing that sometimes, you have to make a little sacrifice to the gods to let things go smoothly. Thus, I am ok when I get into a car accident on the way to an exam and still get my 2 highest Shelf Exam scores. Or when I get rear-ended on the Belt Parkway, on the way to Graduation Weekend.

Yeah, that happened. Fortunately nobody was hurt, but now there's a ton of hassle that goes with it, which starts with my trunk door no longer opening. And graduation went without a hitch, no last minute notices from administration stating that I had failed Band-Aid Class and therefore would not be graduating. So, I am officially, a DOCTOR.

~commence applause~

Otherwise, the 2 day event was surprisingly pleasant. There were no major hitches on behalf of my school, and the event was overall well organized and meaningful to my parents, and followed by a nice brunch afterwards. I'd like to pretend that it wasn't meaningful to stout old me, but in reality, I definitely got teary-eyed more than a few times. The kicker for me was when several of my classmates were hooded by their physician parents, and I realized how much this meant to all the parents out in the audience who had supported their kids all the way. (Ok, I'm getting teary now just thinking about it.) I mentally contrasted things a little bit to the dinner dance our school held for the graduates a few nights before, in which they closed the open bar at 10:15 pm and then kicked us out at 11:15 pm (invitation said 7 - 12), a shenanigan they had also pulled at our Match Party a few months earlier. But nevermind that, it was still nice.

For some reason, I didn't really think that much about gifts for this graduation, and yet people really pulled out all the stops. In addition to the bobble-head doll, I also got quite a bit of money, some Indian dresses, and Operation.



As it turns out, Operation has been upgraded since yester-year and now there are multiple games to be played with increasing levels of difficulty. (I opened mine up yesterday to play with 2 girls I was babysitting, and they accused me of cheating because I'M A SURGEON. Ha.) My aunt, a nephrologist with a doctor husband and md-phd son, wrote a super nice note about how I was the first doctor in the family for my generation. And it was all so meaningful to have my family friends and boyfriend around with me for the ceremony. They made us announce our own names on the stage, and apparently everyone lost it when I said my full name, because my middle name honors my deceased grandmother, and they all felt how excited she would have been for me. My dad hugged me for like an hour and I had to hint at him that we needed to get moving or we'd be trampled in the aisles. And my mom kept telling people over the phone how nice the ceremony was, and I could hear in her voice how proud she felt.

~sniff~

So here I am, a doctor. Bit odd, really. And scary, because now I can't say the phrase "I don't know, I'm just the student". Wow.