As I write this column, I’m sitting in my apartment, which I have not left for the last 80 or so hours.
I’m wearing shorts, a T-shirt and slippers, which has been my uniform since I last ventured outside. I haven’t brushed my hair or shaved in days, and I look a little bit like a pubescent Ted Kaczynski. (I don’t grow the most impressive beard.)
There is a window next to me, so I know that it was sunny today, and since it snowed two days ago, I assume it’s still cold, but to be honest, I don’t even know. The snow that used to be on the plants outside has melted, so I guess it’s not that cold.
Despite all appearances, I haven’t taken a vow of squalor, or decided to become a hermit. Rather, I’m studying for one of my medical board exams. I’ll venture out of my bunker on Wednesday to take the test.
I talked to my girlfriend, a grown-up (more specifically, a working lawyer), about my self-imposed, exam-preparatory confinement, and she told me she was jealous. She said that she really missed studying for exams, even though as a student it was among the most stressful times of the year. She said that when she sees law students with their books spread out in Starbucks, she wishes she had books to spread out in Starbucks.
And even though I’ll probably get rickets if I stay inside any longer, and even though my apartment looks like a war zone (if wars involved medical books and notebooks filled with awful handwriting), I get it. Studying for exams is incredibly liberating.
In my normal life, I wake up before seven and have to be at the hospital by a certain time. The whole time I’m there, I have to pay attention, because either a patient’s life or my grade depends on it. I leave when I’m told to leave, go home, eat dinner and fall asleep while trying to read so I don’t fall behind. Rinse and repeat.
Don’t get me wrong. I really like that life. I learn a lot and I occasionally have the ability to make a difference in the lives of my patients. It makes me happy to wake up in the morning and go to the hospital.
Still, there’s a certain appeal in not having to wake up in the morning at all, at least for a little bit. I don’t have to see anyone, or talk to anyone, or be anywhere except in front of my computer studying. I wake up at 11 a.m., go to sleep at 3 a.m., and even though I spend 90 percent of my waking hours studying, I decide when I want to do it. Unlike every other time in my life, my single-minded focus can be on learning.
It’s like, for 80 hours, I’m in college again—even if it’s the part of college that was always the least fun.
Of course, as my study break comes to an end, undergraduate finals week is just beginning. So as you study, and write papers, and swear off showering for the next week, and binge eat to counteract the stress and complain to your friends about how much work you have and how much studying you need to do, just remember the alternative.
You could not be studying for finals, but then you’d have a job.
Alex Fanaroff is a fourth-year medical student. His column runs every Wednesday.
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