Orange Space

Orange space is a much anticipated period of 2 weeks in which nothing is scheduled. Two rotations and twelve weeks into my third year in medical school, orange space couldn't have come at a better time. No more rushing to the hospital before the residents, who arrive before the attending physicians to talk to all my patients and make sure no "acute events" occurred overnight. No more becoming zombified at the end of a workday from trying to keep everyone happy and impressed with my medical prowess. No more overzealous nods towards the attending, no more "I'll look that up for you!" towards the residents...just empty orange space for a precious 2 weeks.

So it began, a celebration with friends that have re-emerged into their respective hospital and clinic routines. Scrumptious and carbohydrate rich meals at Mia Francesca's, Grand Lux Cafe, and Oiistar wine and orange-mango drinks with Korean sweet potato cake, car-rides filled with laughter and songs, a steadfast marathon of the Twilight Saga, gut renovations of our respective rooms that somehow look like the aftermath of WWIII are all coming to a close on the 5th day of orange space.

Then it hit me. An uncanny yet familiar feeling, a mixture of ambition, action, rebuke, stress, and hope that slithers into my head in the middle of all long weekends, holidays, and unstructured breaks--the five stages of orange space. It starts with ambition: I will exercise for 1 hour everyday, make unprecedented progress on my research project, obtain my driver's license (FINALLY!), purchase a bike, plan an awesome trip for my aunt and cousin visiting from China, read novels, start a blog...Highly motivated and well-rested, my ambitions are coupled with plans and actions, with behaviors that are not so different from a short-lived hypomanic episode. Yet, at the tiniest speed bump, I am derailed, too discouraged to let go of small failures and complete other activities. Then the devilish voice taunts, "see, I knew you couldn't do it". Having received a credible insult to my ego, physiological signs of stress begin to show--the lack of patience and short temper, oilier hair, acne around the chin plague my once bliss-filled orange space. But I refuse to let this cycle become vicious. I am hopeful that just because I didn't go to the gym today, I will surely go tomorrow. I will do a literature search for my research project and read the handbook of driving rules.

The reasons, therefore, for restarting a blog is multi-pronged. One major reason is to use this as a way to keep me more adherent to my goals for orange space. Perhaps when my goals are published in an nebulous cyberspace that no one will probably read, I'll be more motivated. Another, equally major reason is the urge to write something that does not always sound something like "patient presents to the clinic with...patient has past medication history of...patient denies..." I missed writing complete sentences and embellishing those sentences to sound pretty and pretentious. So here I am, easing myself into non-medical vocabulary and proper grammar. Wish me luck!