Oh yeah, I matched.
A little email came from the NRMP (fancy schmancy find a residency thingy) with all of three(ish) words: Congratulations, you’ve matched!
You are now an adult. You now have a job. You now are responsible for the lives of others. You know have health insurance. You are going to get paid. And pay taxes. And do taxes.
The enormity of it boggles me. And so at the same time that relief flooded over me, I also felt a sense of panic. Fear. Complete and utter showdown. So I bury myself in little things that don’t matter. New shower curtains. Matching towels. My over-one-year-old basil plants. These things, all of these things are coming with me, I tell myself. To fill up a room and call it home. Cover myself with things and more things, and perhaps I will never be able to feel that fearfearfear at all.
But I look around and see things accumulating and good god, how will I find a place for everything? So it has to go. All of it. Piles of things-to-keep and piles of things-to-go. Then I dive into the things-to-go and seperate them further. Pretty-sure and not-so-sure. Not-so-sure grows much quicker than expected. They’re just things. Yet I hold on to them like life and blood and sweat and tears.
And suddenly, want and need start to look very much the same.
