Let me tell you about my barber

That’s right, I have a barber who I regularly go to for my haircuts. Never had a barber before I moved to Toledo. Usually whenever I needed a haircut I would just go to some haircut franchise like Hot Clips or something like that where they hire girls straight out of the local beauty school. So usually I would get my haircut from a new girl every time I went, so I never had a regular barber that I preferred. Well that all changed when I moved to Toledo. Let me explain how it all happened.

Moving to Toledo I somehow knew that I would eventually need to get a haircut. This worried me because I had no idea where to get a haircut. When the time came for my hair cut I was panicking. Fortunately I remembered that when I first checked my mail box at school there was a flier inside for some kind of a barbershop. “Barbershop eh? Hmmm…this might not be a bad idea,” is what I thought. So I looked up the address and I hopped in my car and I drove to see this so called barbershop. That is how I met Howard, my barber. Howard is an elderly person and I have no idea how old he is but he is a great guy who lived an interesting life and he gives really great haircuts. When he was done with my hair I knew I would be coming back again and again.

So let me tell you a little about Howard. Like I said he is an old man, he is the owner of the barbershop, he has lived in Toledo his entire life and has actually never been outside of Toledo and doesn’t “give a damn either.” His barbershop is divided into cubicles and he employs two other barbers. I never see them because I always give Howard a call when I need a haircut because Howard is the man. Howard’s cubicle is cool because it has a mannequin in it (just the upper body, nothing below the waist) that always has a different hat on it, or sunglasses or something else. His cubicle also has a nice portrait of Jesus with sign on it that says “Friend” which for some reason I think is really cool. He also has a little chalkboard hanging on one of his cubicle walls with a border that says “days left until X-mas” and you just write in the number with chalk, so it’s a countdown until Christmas chalkboard and every day he makes sure to write in how many days are left. I think that is really cool. Good old Howard, he really loves Christmas.

There is something really cool about sitting in a barbershop getting your hair cut and talking to the barber that you know by name and have known long enough for him to remember to ask you how that exam went and so on. Kind of reminds me of some movie about a barbershop where the guy talks to the barber. This also make me feel all grown up, except it doesn’t because I am probably the youngest person that is a regular at that barbershop, because everyone else that comes to get their haircut there is a senior citizen. They all know me by name now and recognize my voice when I call. I love this place and I will keep getting my hair cut there because Howard is an excellent barber and he is a really great guy.

Peace be with you

If I saw you coming and smiled to you but you did not smile back, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.
If we stopped to eat and I shared my food with you but you didn’t share your water, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.
If you called on me for help and I answered but you didn’t answer when I called, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.
If I opened up to you and told you who I am but you did not open up to me, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.
If I gave you complements and I gave you praise but you put me down and humiliated me, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.
If I loved you more than I love myself but you betrayed me, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.
If I showed you my most cherished possession and you took it from me, do not worry, peace be with you my brother.

Back to the Back Row

Its the day before school begins again and I’m ready. I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready. Am I? Second year of medical school, can’t be that different from first year. Right? I don’t know. I guess I should have been asking people one year of ahead of me what second year will be like, but I haven’t been. Hell, I didn’t really think I would make it this far. Immunity and Infection, can’t be that hard….can it? Organ systems, ha, that’s just anatomy again, just in more detail….great. At least no FCP or PBL until November or something, that’s nice, but eerie. They can’t be that nice to us. There must be a reason, oh right, that’s because the first two months are pretty rough, that’s about the only thing I did hear about 2nd year. But I’m excited to get started, I’m ready. I can’t wait.

This year will be different. Oh, I’ll still be in the back row, a tiger don’t change its stripes, no doubt. But things will be different I’m sure. We have to print out the notes on our own this time. What’s that about? School trying to save some money or something? Maybe they think we want to stare at a computer screen all day. Forget it, I get enough of that by writing and reading blogs, I don’t want to go blind, I don’t think so. I’m assuming most of us will print out the notes because most of us tend to write things down in class and then there are some of us who make lots of notes (you all know who you are). I’m going to assume that most people will head to the library computer lab to print out the notes, so it looks like it will still be the schools paper used for the notes. So whatever the reason for making us print out the notes on our own instead of handing them out all together, well it doesn’t make any sense to me.

Things will be different. I’m going to make more of an effort to get to know the professors. Last year I felt bad for not getting to know them better, plus I might need them to write me a letter of recommendation. I’m not sure who the 4th years ask to write them a letter, maybe it’s the faculty from their 3rd year rotations or maybe not, but I haven’t really gotten to know any of the professors so maybe its time to get better acquainted. So if you see me heading down to ask questions during breaks don’t be surprised and don’t confuse me for a gunner either. That’s not my style. Back row here I come.

I root for the underdog

Like a lot of people, I like to see the smaller and weaker opponent defeat the bigger and powerful one. The desire to see the underdog win might be human nature. I mean this goes back in history all the way to David vs. Goliath. Seems like there were people that always cheered for the underdog. Its just more exciting, isn’t it? To see the weak triumph over the strong. To see a not so great team defeat a great team to win some trophy, that’s something to see. I’m not much of a sports fan myself, although I do enjoy watching the world cup and the Olympics. A lot of people always cheer for the Brazilian soccer team, because they are the greatest, they are the best of the best and people expect that. I could never cheer for them, no matter how much I wanted to, knowing they are the greatest at this sport. Always, I wanted them to lose, always I cheered for the underdog. I was thrilled whenever they would lose, especially to a country that is much weaker then they are. Then when it comes to Olympic basketball, its hard because I have to root for the US team, even though we are so much better at basketball then everyone else. I have to root for US because somewhere in my closet there is a piece of paper that says I’m American, and for all I know if I don’t cheer for US, they might take that piece of paper away and give me the boot. So I root for US, even though deep down I want the underdog to beat us. I guess in a way, the reason I always root for the underdog is because in a way I am an underdog myself because I never really had that many victories, I could probably count them on my fingers. I root for the underdog and I am happy to see the underdog win because I know what’s like to be the underdog. And so, I root for the underdog.

Don't Depend on Hope

They say….they say that hope is a dangerous thing to lose. Well, I say hope is a dangerous thing to cling to. Hope can become an excuse for inaction. An excuse for cowardice. An excuse for an excuse. Hoping is not going to make the world better. Hoping wont stop hunger, it won’t fix the national health care system, it won’t insure the uninsured, it won’t educate the uneducated, it wont unite the Sunnis and Shiites, the Jews and the Muslims, it won’t stop the atrocities it Darfur, it won’t do anything, because hope is not action, it is inaction. This blog is not a call to abandon hope; rather it’s a call to embrace action. Hope could be a good thing but its better to not depend on hope. Because once you depend on it, hope becomes an excuse for simply saying “well its out of my hands, I’ll just wait for somebody else to fix my problems.” It is never out of your hands, and if you don’t do anything about it, likely nobody else will, because everybody else is just like you, “hoping” you yourself or somebody else will fix your problem. We need to stop hoping that the world gets better. We need to get off our butts and help ourselves so that we can help each other. Only then will this world change for the better. Only when we stop hoping, when we take action to better ourselves will we be able to better each other and make the world a better place. Remember that cheesy Michael Jackson song from the 80s Man in the Mirror. Well it isn’t all that cheesy, the man had a point. It does start with the man in the mirror, to help the world you must start with yourself first, you must look in the mirror and you must make that change. Don’t hope that the change will come with time, make that change now. Too bad old Jacko couldn’t listen to his own advice. But don’t ridicule him too much. Most of us don’t have what it takes to make that change, not just Jacko. I am not a hypocrite. I know how hard it is to make changes. Every night I go to bed I say to myself that tomorrow I will start to make the changes, that I will drop my vices, that I will make myself a better person. Then come morning, I wake up, I brush my teeth, I look in the mirror and I know I won’t do it. I am too weak, I leave it to hope that someday I will make the changes, but hope won’t do it for me. Hope is not a great thing. Was it hope that saved humanity from genocide after genocide after genocide while the world watched and hoped? They weren’t saved because they were weak, because the world was weak. All hoped that the world wouldn’t just stand by and watch this happen to humanity. Well, their hope failed them just like it’s failing in Darfur today. Nothing has changed since then. The world today is just as savage and ruthless as it has always been, because we are as weak as we have always been, we still need to make changes. The other day I was watching some Democratic candidate interview type thing and this guy in crutches came up and made this whole speech about how he lost his job and now has no insurance and can’t bear to look into the face and eyes of his beloved wife who is without health insurance. He asked John Edwards what is wrong with America and what is he prepared to do about it. John Edwards looked at him and then said “you are the perfect example of what is wrong with America today.” I couldn’t agree more, no matter how much I dislike Edwards. Our government is only as strong and good as its citizens are, just look at our president. We only have ourselves to blame for the inadequacy and stupidity of our president, because we put him there. Yes it was us, it was you and it was me, even if we didn’t vote for him (I know I didn’t) we are just as responsible as that other 50 percent of people who did vote him back in. It was our hope for a safer America, for a better world, that put that retard and his psychopath vice president back in the White House. Most of us lacked the courage, the confidence, and the responsibility to improve our country so we chose to leave that burden on somebody else and hope that things turn out right. Well that hope failed us and that is why we are where we are today. I mean just look at the circus around Alberto Gonzales, I mean this administration doesn’t even try to keep things under the table anymore, the lies and the arrogance are no longer shocking, they have become amusing. But they say, if you lose everything and you don’t have hope, then you have nothing. Wrong. It’s because of hope that you ended up with nothing. If you never had hope you would never have lost whatever you lost, because you would have been strong enough to take actions into your own hands and nobody would be able to take everything away from you. Don’t depend on hope, stay way from it or else you will end up lost. Once in a while something great comes along and makes you believe in hope. Something wonderful happens to you and you start to make changes and you start to become better and more confident and you realize that things are finally going your way that you are becoming that person you always wanted it to be. Sounds really nice, sounds wonderful. Well it won’t last forever. Easy come and easy go, and since these changes did not materialize through your struggles, through your actions, through your decisions, since these things came to be because some event or some person did them for you, then when that situation is gone, when that person leaves, trust me you will be left exactly where you began. All that which was good and wonderful that which was given to you, will be taken away, because it didn’t come to be from yourself it come from outside and that can always be taken away. The point is, don’t wait for good things to happen so that you can improve, make sure that you improve from within, from inside, through your own struggle, because nobody can take that away from you. Because if the good came from within you, it will always stay with you and it you will never lose it, no matter what life throws at you. Believe me, hope is for the weak and the weak will always stay weak because they can’t let go of hope, they are too scared to let go of it. Because once you let go, then that means you must make actions, you must make confrontations, and the weak are afraid of such things. Help the weak we must, but we cannot do it for them, they have to do it themselves, they must earn it through their struggle, because if we do it for them, once we leave, they fail and they will go back to where the were before we came. This is exactly why we are where we are today in Iraq, that is why Iraq will fail because they didn’t earn freedom through their own struggles, through their own blood and sacrifice the way we earned our freedom, they were given their freedom by us. You can’t do it for them. You should help, of course you should, but you can’t do it for them, they have to do it for themselves, otherwise they will fail. I am not a hypocrite. I too am afraid of action, of confrontations, of decisions, of responsibility. But that ends now. This is one of the reasons why I am here, in medical school. I knew what this was about from the beginning. This is a journey of nothing but actions, confrontations, decisions, and responsibility. This journey will force me to confront all of my fears and once I face my fears and accept my fears, I will have no choice but to make that change, to get through it, and become the person I always hoped to be. But it won’t be because of hope; it will be because of me, of what I will do. I will do it. You should do it too. Let go of your hopes, don’t wait for it to happen someday, because it won’t happen unless you make it happen. Let go of hope, face your fear, and make the change. We can do it, we can make ourselves better and then we came make our country better. This isn’t cheesy, this isn’t funny, this isn’t pointless, this is me reaching out to all of you, because I care about you, all of you, and I want us all to be happy, but it won’t happen until we make it happen, so lets make it happen, all of us, right now.