003

As we wander though this strangely beautiful life, we define our existence by what is, and what is not.  There is little room for anything in the space between.  We love with little regard for self preservation, we hate with perfected irony, and we rationalize our intrinsic properties with science.  We are the only creature that has transcended the biological laws by which we have built our understanding.  We are either the beginning of an entirely new era, or a simple dead end in a small corner of the cosmos.  Either way, this letter is for you.

Dearest Friend,

                It seems like such long and tiresome periods exist to define the space between our hearts.  You don't really know who I am, and it stings like a dullness too deep to discriminate; you've never really known who I am. But I've known you.  With a smile on my face and with joy in my heart I have paid you attention, never losing a moment on you.  Like the child is fascinated by the penny, like the innocent soul plays in the imagination, I too have believed such things about you.  There are no words for that which you've inspired in me, just know that it's lovely.  You've been lovely.  You've been my muse.  When I think of you I fill with the bittersweet, and struggle to fight the wonderful tears that encompass a nature unrelenting; waves on the shores of my mind.  It knocks at my door; I stare out from behind the windowpane that becomes my allegory.  I suppose some would call me mad, but I've read stories about beautiful places, and those who inhabit these worlds are often mad as well, and I enjoy them so.  Maybe it's not such a bad thing, to be mad.  I thought I read about you in a Dickens novel, and then I thought I heard you in a song…I thought I touched you in a dream.  My waking hours are long; they reach into the smaller moments, where I spend my mind poor.  The bits and moments in between have been filled with you.  My dearest Friend, you haven't aged a day.  I've seen the Mona Lisa, but it was your smile that brought mystery to my life.  I've heard the Fur Elise, but it was your laugh that opened the windows of my soul.  The breeze flowed in, and it stole my heart away.  You were there, when I first saw Rome, and you were there, when I first felt love.  I'll never grow old, dearest Friend.  You taught me not to grow old.

The audience goes quiet now, the passers-by in the street.  No one needs to say it; no one needs to break the silence that comes for peace of mind.  It's been quiet for so long, and I miss you so very much.  I'm just a picture in your world, but this picture is mine and not yours.   Drawn on a simple piece of paper, you may not remember me at all. That was long ago, when you created, when you were small.  You were my artist; you splattered color on all of the white.  Like rain it all poured down, and like rain it helped life along.  I sense you everywhere I go.  Sunshine beams through the green of the trees, washing golden over the earth, sparkling on the riverbed; it’s your eyes.  Nature speaks with the flutter of wings and the buzz of the bees, the hummingbird drinks and the wooly bear crawls; it’s you breathing.  Shackled to this cold, bus stop bench, it’s bleak and gloomy, as the paper wrappers and wispy snow whisper down this road of concrete.  Seems I’ve come a long way from the place where I first knew you.  The road doesn’t end, and I see you less often now.  You’ve become less than real, and more than any dream.  It seems that such long and tiresome periods exist to define the space between our hearts.  You don't know me, but I’d like to believe I've known you.  I suppose I’ll never be sure, after all it’s been so long.   I’ll write it in a letter, one I’ve never meant to send.  The boy puts the firefly in a jar, with all the wonder in the world he watches until its light goes away.  If you knew what you were, you would no longer be what you are.  If only the boy knew that the price of his wonder would be the cost of a life.  No, you must never know, my dearest Friend.  I know who you are, and what you’ve been to me.  In relativity I find you, magnificent as the stones on Easter Island. There has been no sadness like this sadness you have touched me with.  The most vast and immeasurable feeling that I’ve ever had.  It spills when I move.  I love you, dearest Friend.  With all that I am, I love you. 

Spatter 

002

Excluding extreme circumstances, I have come to understand that opportunity is a mythical creature.  It will not come to knock on your door, you will not find it in your travels.  You may search far and wide, but it will not be hiding, waiting to be found.  Do not look for opportunity, rather look for yourself.  Ask not how the world will change you; change should be resolute and with purpose. Change is not manifested upon command, it comes slowly, after reflection and understanding. Instead, ask yourself how it is that you will alter the world, such that it will take a different, a better path. You are but a small quantum of energy; but you are the product of billions of years of cosmological and biological evolution, and what you do today, will certainly resonate into the billions of years ahead, and possibly, eternity.  This much must be true within the confines of logic.  There is, of course, the exception that proves the rule, the glaring contradiction.  You have but one opportunity, and it has already been given to you.  Make it count for something that you can be proud of.  These are just my thoughts on paper, so to speak.  As always, I remain excited to learn, prepared to change, and aware of my fallibility.  But until next time, please live long.  

Spatter

001

To sacrifice the greater hours of your life, and the smallest hours of your nights for a grand purpose: To heal those who are meant to stay, ease those who are meant to go, and to fight appropriately, within the confines of ethics and knowledge, for all those in between the great divide. To me, this is what it means to be a doctor. This privilege is a profound one; to observe life in its beginnings, its middles, and its ends.  This profession is one to be approached with outstanding humility, passion, and above all else, empathy.  The doctor stands between the patient and the vast unknown; the doctor must ameliorate the pain, both mental and physical, whilst maintaining perspective.  I've been in medical school for one week, and buried in these books, I feel alive.  Until next time, live long.