Another Chapter Begins
Here begins another chapter. Not necessarily a fresh one, as notes were left in the margins from a time not too long before, but there still remains plenty of space for new ideas. While a clean slate is preferable, maybe these smudges from the past remain to allow new light shed to appear more clearly.
From the time I was young they said I was to pursue the life of a physician. Such a career was expected, alongside lacrosse games and New England estates. They’d ramble on in fancy scientific words and snicker when one asked what “coelio-mesenteric” meant. For every time you stepped through the door with a book on Shakespeare or Swift, they’d hand you seven studies on physiology and medical terminology. There is no future in sonnets or plays, and the world needs more STEM people, or so they said. After all, they had a single valid point: somewhere along the way there was a glitch in my software, making reading and comprehending speech difficult, so why waste my time meticulously picking through the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson when I could learn to understand images from x-rays? So, for years I followed in their footsteps, unable to construct a valid argument in defense of devoting time to poetry and plays.
Not until the first fall semester of university did I look off the dormitory balcony one cool evening, watching the clouds bleed with the sunset and colleagues in sherpa-fleece jackets leave the dining hall with Styrofoam to-go boxes, did I come to realise why I had a young passion for an activity I was terrible at. You see, there is a single truly correct way to construct a body. Modifications lead to consequences, whether those are scars, an intolerance of food or beverage, or a drastic weight loss, they are all ramifications for altering a body. Information studied by those entering the medical field is all similar, and in most cases must be regurgitation the same fashion the information entered. The body has a limit. However, information studied by those in the English field may go in the same, but in some cases is not required to be regurgitated in the same manner. While the physical body is limited, the mind is limited only when placed in a box. With studying the written thoughts of others, there is some room for individual interpretation -- room for independent thought and creativity. Rather than being placed in a box, you are placed in a puddle, allowing the opportunity to splash about freely rather than being confined to a neat space.
After a year of thought and discontent, my mind made peace with closing the door to scientific pursuit and family expectations. The problem faced was not with finding a new place, but rather with how is someone faced with reading and auditory difficulties supposed to open a door to literature? If you are ready to take the jump, then I suggest climbing through the window instead. The fall may be greater for some than others, and was intimidating in my case, but rest assured, there will be someone to catch you at the bottom.
With a new light and an old book, I found a place where I am content. So, they can enjoy their Maseratis, pristine lab coats, and M.D. degrees adorning their office space, but I found happiness between the walls of an old fixer-upper Cape Cod, a rusty blue Jeep, and falling in love with the works of Thomas Hardy.