#medschool
Consolation prizes are always small and devastatingly adequate.
We've all taken tests - if you haven't - I want your secret.
We (my study group) spent two weeks at my place (6th Ave).
prepping for finals - which are now only half complete.
These tests take everything we've learned this year in separate modules, like anatomy, physiology, pharmacology - and compresses them, like doppio - questioning not just the fact, but where it belongs, and how it fits the whole. Eeeeek!
Working in a group makes studying feel less like punishment,
and more like prep for a game we might win.
There are four of us - Emma, Léah, Chloé and me.
Emma’s all sharp synthesis - capable of organizing any chaos,
Léah spots the strange detail, the hidden thread, that no one else saw,
Chloé brings speed - she has near total-recall,
and I'm good at naming patterns and tying up loose-threads
- Said slightly more poetically..
We’re optimized girls
who score higher than everyone else
high-yield, low-maintenance types
hydrated by iced coffee and espressos.
We know the names of things
we know you inside out
We've learned to perform concern
in a medically appropriate register,
because we know what's theoretically possible.
We abbreviate, speaking in acronyms like Navajo code-talkers,
because our frank opinions are socially discouraged.
We've learned to speak clearly about bodies,
while getting less time to enjoy our own.
Our tests are half-way done. I think If we stopped - just stopped doing the work - the silence would be enormous, like stepping out of a machine, that was louder than we knew - but no one’s stopping.
.
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Songs for this:
Smash by Born At Midnite
Paraiso by Pearl & The Oysters
May 10
May 10, 2026 at 12:13 AM UTC
I need to put my calendar on Wegovy
There are four of us in my study group,
Emma, from Lyon, a tall brunette, To her, everything’s a moral question or a joke.
Léah, from Étretata (Normandy) a waifish redhead, who’s either quiet or a total riot.
Chloé, an anorexic ex-ballerina, from Paris (the living theater) who talks of quitting every Tuesday.
In our study group rituals
- caffeine is our sacrament
and Anki is our confirmation.
We read the sacred texts (class notes),
annotated in colors that signify ‘don't forget that,’
and “this will be on the exam (probably).”
Emma says “my life is an Anki-fest.”
Léah says “time’s a construct and sleep a trap.”
Chloé says “let's do (review) one more chapter”
the way an alcoholic suggests,
“let’s just get one last drink.”
We diagnose strangers on the metro
a cough, a rash, a limp, a hand tremor,
with the confidence of prophets.
Whispering about “classic presentations”
We all want to be 'high-yield'.
We have daily in-group rankings,
for creating the best flashcards
and the best sleep score.
Today’s lunch is gone
and I don’t remember eating it.
Emma pronounces that normal
Léah logs it in an app as “fuel.”
On our last quiz our scores were almost identical.
Chloé says we should celebrate and all agreeing,
we ordered eclairs and espressos.
9 days until first year final exams.
.
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Songs for this:
Think It Over by Born At Midnite
100 horses by Geese
Apr 27
Apr 27, 2026 at 12:38 PM UTC
We have too little time not to use it wisely
I was enjoying lunch
a sandwich with some potato chip crunch
when it hit me like a rush
- I’m in a (med-school) cult!
The girls at my table
Emma, Léah and Chloé,
my solid, study group three
all dress alike, more or less
we're all doing the same things
we study, laugh too loudly at nothing,
we romanticize burnout as a sort of chic
we compare our grades like horoscopes,
and we're all somewhere on the caffeine curve
To join our little group
you must know what an osmole is
and you must be slightly behind
but never admit how far
Like all cults there are rules,
we must pretend it’s all manageable,
and insist, to everyone, that “I’m fine.”
Emma says she dreams of Anki now.
Léah hasn’t texted her mother back in three weeks.
Chloé swears she’ll quit after this year,
which we all accept as part of the liturgy
because she's not even trying to leave.
As we eat, we scroll, and diagnose each other casually,
triaging the stages and conditions of early 20s life
“Did that guy ever call?”
It's hard to find a guy who understands
why you'd cancel plans to memorize something
We say, “it’s probably nothing”
with the authority of girls who know it's probably everything.
Anyway, my sandwich is gone, the chips too
someone mentions exams
(We’ve 13 days until first year final exams)
and we all stand up at once,
like we’ve heard a bell.
.
.
Songs for this:
BIRDS OF A FEATHER by Billie Eilish
WHERE IS MY HUSBAND! by RAYE
Fortnight (feat. Post Malone) by Taylor Swift
Apr 23
Apr 23, 2026 at 2:09 PM UTC
Semester finals are next week.
The ultimate study groove requires a certain ambience, like a cafe.
Nothing fancy, any shop that’ll let me grift, at a table unbothered, for six hours - with the rain tip-tapping the window, like a pulse needing auscultation - will do.
I’m on the no-sleep bus and there’s no coasting
luckily, my hippocampus flourishes in café's light.
I’m trading sleep for synapses
with drills on repeat - if I rest, I forget, if I keep thinking, I fray
but exhaustion can buy me two more rounds of flashcards
I’m pumping espresso blood
wearing half-ironed looks
Have you ever noticed how the Paris metro-map resembles a somatic nerve? On the metro, between Porte de Saint-Ouen and École Militaire
- as Paris slides by - I practice diagramming the scapula on my iPad Air. Blurry Paris, blurry neon, blurry anatomy.
And I’m starting to think in Latin - ‘os talus coniungitur..’
If I’m not memorizing something,
it’s because my mind’s been scraped raw
and I’m on autopilot - more often than not,
Peter (my bf) drags me to bed @ 2am
But salvation comes - next Saturday - in the form of Noel school break.
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🎄🦌 Songs for this: 🎄🦌
https://daweb.us/xmas/Christmas_18.mp3
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os talus coniungitur = nursery rhyme “the ankle bone’s connected to..”
auscultation = examination
Dec 12, 2025
Dec 12, 2025 at 9:40 AM UTC
I got a text from one of my professors yesterday saying, ‘Please stop by my office at 6 pm tomorrow.’ It didn’t say why. This was the first day after November recess, had I missed something? That night, I’d gone through the syllabus, checking every recent and upcoming assignment - I was grable. But there I was, the next evening, waiting nervously - my anxiety stripped of context.
I was one of three waiting in the hall. There was a guy and a girl there too. There were only two chairs, so I stood, and stood, set my bookbag down and stood. As the minutes rolled by. I resented them - each - individually. It was 6:05, I had a class at 7pm but it was just down the hall.
Then the girl was called and the guy moved to the chair next to the door. I sagged into his vacated chair. It was wooden and stiff but it beat standing. I pulled my AirPods out of my bookbag and started a playlist called, “Me and the devil.” The music was hard-rock, bluesy and raunchy, but not distracting for reading.
I picked the textbook for my next class out of my bag but it was no go. I found myself re-reading everything. The girl came out of the office about five minutes later - she looked upset. The guy then knocked and was admitted.
I moved over next to the door and checked my watch. I’d been there twenty-five minutes, and it was 6:15. The guy was out in moments - he looked ok, his movements quick and business-like. I double-tapped my right Air Pod to pause the music and picked up my bookbag. The professor couldn’t see me, his window was frosted, at most I would have been a shadow.
The door was open so I peered inside, before I could knock, he looked up, as if he’d felt the pressure of my gaze. “Mz. Vionet,” he said, he didn’t smile but held his hand palm up, motioning to a chair in front of his desk.
“You’d emailed me about a reference (back in September),” he began. (In order to get into a Med school, you have to have X number of recommendations - this was something my mom had insisted I ask my professors for early.)
As he talked, something struck me. I’d heard him talking to the guy before me and he seemed to talk to me more quietly, as if I were fragile. “What are your graduate study goals?” He asked.
As I talked, I watched the way he listened to me. He looked down at his fingernails, turning them over like they were new and unknown. I was suddenly afraid this was an act of performative boredom. **** I thought, “he’s going to stall or turn me down.” I felt my face grow hot, but I continued, although I could feel myself deflate a bit.
By the time I was done explaining my med-school ambitions and how I’d been grinding away on M-CAT prep (the Med-school admissions test that I’ll take next summer), in my spare time, I felt spent.
He looked up and nodded. “Well,” he said, opening the top drawer of his desk and extracting a sealed envelope, “you’re certainly killing it here. I have no doubt you’ll do well on your M-CAT.”
He smiled broadly as he handed me the envelope. “Let me know if there’s anything else you need.”
I reached for the envelope, almost in a daze. It felt papery, thick, solid and almost electric.
“Thank YOU!” I’d said, bouncing out of my seat with relief. I somehow stopped myself from giving him a giddy Elvis impression, “Thank you, Thank you vera mush.”
I think I floated to my next class.
Dec 1, 2023
Dec 1, 2023 at 11:06 PM UTC
It’s Sunday morning, about 8am. My BF Peter and I we’re doing our laundry. Most of the time, we spent in my dorm common room, sitting side by side on a red corduroy couch, while our clothes washed, and then tumbled away in the dryer. If you want privacy on a college campus, or to do laundry in peace, avoiding the weekend laundry rush, do it before 10am.
"Why do you wear these," Peter asked, pulling and lightly snapping the hair-band on my wrist.
I pull my hand back, protectively. "If I don’t have a hair-band on my wrist I feel out of control."
There’s a new me. I’d decided - civilized, unemotional, clear-sighted.
"I've got a lot to do before summer,” Peter said earlier, “so I made a spreadsheet.”
I felt a shadow pass over me - our future is, at best, undecided. So, I shifted gears, the way the new me is trying to do lately.
“A Spreadsheet!” I said, like I approved, and he grinned. I’d made him happy. This is what adults do, I’d decided, they have civilized conversations where decisions were made or avoided - but there was a small, dark thing in my heart.
I got a text from our dryer saying our clothes were dry, so we headed down. I love the smell of fresh laundry and the feeling of shaved legs against fresh bed sheets - a luxurious combination no guy will ever understand. I made a mental note to shave my legs later.
The last couple of weeks I’ve been working on summer fellowship applications. A successful summer fellowship is one of those things I’ll need when I apply for med-school - like grades, faculty letters, physician recommendations, community service, a great MCAT score, bla bla bla.
My mom knows the 200 things med-schools use to cleave away pretenders and she’ll rattle them off upon request and sometimes over groaning protests.
What I need, ideally, this summer, are clinical experience hours. There’s not much at stake, just my future, the respect of the faculty, and the begrudging acknowledgement of my pre-med peers. My mom was quizzing me on my progress last night. I confirmed that all the applications were in and I ended with, “I haven’t slept with anyone yet, to gain advantage - but we’re still early in the process.”
She was not amused.
Feb 20, 2023
Feb 20, 2023 at 2:13 PM UTC
Five years of
studying and learning
how to save
a life and
How to ease their pain
Five years of
endless laughter
silly smiles
and golden friendship
Five years of
wandering soul
trying to find
solace
Five years of
building self
and
just being me
Five years of
eternity
Finally
ends ...
Feb 10, 2016
Feb 10, 2016 at 4:03 PM UTC
She can cut diamonds.
There will always be
Some hard elements
Scattered along the way
But she will be at it
Because she can cut diamonds.
Jan 12, 2016
Jan 12, 2016 at 9:39 AM UTC
Hour 20:
The white walls soffocating me,
I'm a walking zombie
and a hero wannabe.
The background sounds
beep, beep, beep
and I just wanna sleep.
I have a worried mother
whose child has fever,
and a not-so-hurt drunk driver
that tonight became a killer.
A 40 year old that's been coughing a few days
and thought of coming to the ER at 4am
because, hey, they are probably not so busy anyways.
I like my job,
and I love saving lives,
but God knows I have to put in order mine.
A heart has stopped in bed number nine,
chest compressions and meds don't make it beat,
I don't want to, but I gotta call it.
A teenager needs stitches,
she's making a mess,
apparently her scar is more important than anyone else.
A few more hours and I can go home,
time is passing slowly.
Hey, look! There is the sun!
Jul 8, 2013
Jul 8, 2013 at 8:53 PM UTC