Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Mud Pies to Medicine: My Life

The concept for the title of my blog comes from a musing I had one day as an undergrad reflecting on the wonders of childhood while pulling an all-nighter and trying to write a personal statement to medical school. In a frustrated rant, this is what came out:

"Sometimes this world is spinning faster than it did in the old days.

I miss making mud pies. There is this huge rock in my front yard. To call it a rock really does it a dishonor. It is a boulder, brought home by my father on a huge dump truck after he blasted it out of a work site. My mom one day told me that even though it is nearly 2.5 feet high, 6 feet long, and 2.5 feet wide, that it was, in fact, only half-showing. The scientist inside of me was disbelieving and set out to get some proof. Clad in a dress, bow in my hair, and my best accessory, a shovel, I trudged outside ready to prove my mother wrong. That is when the digging began. I dug, and dug, and dug, and nearly all 3.5 feet of Danielle fit in that hole when I had reached the bottom of the rock. That became my digging spot, my mud pie kitchen. Each day it was dug, and each evening it was filled back in. Sometimes the holes were small, sometimes they were enormous, and most days the hole was turned into my mud mixing bowl with that rock as my counter. The novelty never wore off. The ebb and flow of my childhood was, in many ways, measured by the ever-changing depth of that hole in the front yard, the hole that never really disappeared even each day after it was filled in. Even though the grass has grown back in that spot, there still remains, an indentation, the scars of my childhood and the disbelieving scientists I have always been.

So, RWJ, you ask me why I want to be a doctor? I do not want to be a doctor. I want to open a mud pie bakery with the cash register on that rock in my front yard. But, somehow, I doubt I would stay in business long, for the world seems to have lost its taste for mud pies. I guess being a doctor will have to do."

And while I did not end up sending this to medical school, I did end up getting in. This blog is meant to be a reflection on everything from mud pies to medicine (with photos when I can). I have quite a bit of photos already so while my life is not all too exciting right now, I'll try to chronicle some of the past. I hope you enjoy it!

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