Enter me
from stage right into a system of healing and trauma.
At twenty-two, what did I know of this world,
having been sheltered within four suburban walls and housed in a body
whose conventional spinning cogs allowed for esteemed
Productivity.
Fragile me.
During those first years
when I was told that I was should be a sponge,
but felt that I must be made of impermeable styrofoam.
Now I see that memorizing glomerulonephritides and
remembering names of your patient’s grandchildren
are two different skills.
Hardened me.
Some experiences change you
and you cannot go back to who you were
Before.
Wondering now, what would it be like to not know
what the weight of a human heart in your hands feels like?
Like doodling a heart on a friend’s birthday card
and not automatically scoffing at the anatomical inaccuracy.
What would it be like to not feel
the pit in your stomach after glimpsing an MRI full of metastases?
Like hearing the phrase “together forever”
and still believing that one of you won’t have to leave first.
Disillusioned me.
The next layer of awakening to the fact that
the foundations of society did not grow from the ground,
but were created, manufactured to be unjust
by people not dissimilar to me.
“Some people are not worth saving.”
It cuts deeply into
the dream of inherent beneficence
that was once my life preserver.
Fearful me.
I wonder if a butterfly ever scares the caterpillar that still lives within.
Fear is a part of transformation, after all.
I fear
Being part of a machine without room for creativity.
Being part of a system that hurts more than it heals.
Being complicit.
Complicity is multiplied by power.
Meditating on whether donning the long white coat will
fetter me to the whiteness
that chokes off our common humanity.
Having been bestowed an impressive power, I think,
“But isn’t the line between hero and villain often blurred?”
This me
walks to center stage at the end of four years
and tries to perform my 11 o’clock number.
I ask
Have I truly learned anything?
Am I worthy of this praise?
How am I supposed to change any of this?
Pick up the fragmented pieces I’ve collected
and assemble a collage that means
something.
Hopeful me.
Eyes open,
wary but determined.
Relieved that within this unfair game
I have teammates I can trust
and we can do more together than apart.
Community
is the most overused and beautiful word
that I’ve added to my vocabulary.
Maybe I can sleep peacefully
knowing that it’s not just
Me.
Alanna Ticali is an MS4 at the Perelman School of Medicine.
Image by Tracy Du, an MS1 at the Perelman School of Medicine.
