Yesterday I delivered the final lecture in the Radiology lecture series I have presented to the first year medical students. I'm hoping it was well-received and most of them seemed interested. I was able to reflect on the lecture this morning on my way to work with what limited attention span I have when I'm driving and it occurred to me how oblivious medical students in pre-clinical years can potentially be. To most of them, it is mostly about lectures, learning objectives and textbooks; despite the emphasis that patients are in fact the most important component of medical education. There are exceptions to the rule and I definitely was not one of them in my pre-clinical years.
Saturday for the last few weeks has been the busiest day of the week - I do almost 2-3 hours of driving, meet a few people and seldom make it home for dinner. But when I talk to my good friends, Saturday is a day to sleep in, enjoy a hearty and hot breakfast with loved ones and think about things such as the weather, music and sport. Saturday is for going out, enjoying a few drinks with friends and sharing laughs over some food. It's also for clubbing, dancing and meeting new people for the curious.
But for me, Saturday is about work, doing favours for friends and family, occasionally eating. I do spend time with friends and family, though sometimes I don't want to. I would love to sleep in and not think about what to do, who to meet and what to prepare. I want to wash my car, pick out all the leaves from under the bonnet while listening to music. Sometimes, I don't want to communicate with anybody. I just want to listen to ambient noise.
When did Saturdays get so busy? It all started in year 4, when my parents decided to send me to Saturday school for developing my language skills in Turkish. So I only was able to sleep in on Sunday mornings, but most of the time my parents would wake me early to have a family breakfast (not that I'm complaining - it's awesome food). That clarified a lot for me - Saturday has been forged in my head to be a day of work or study, unlike most of my friends in school who enjoyed the sleep ins, soccer games and Centennial park. After primary school, it was Saturday high school, after that came work at Harvey Norman and Math Tuition, after that came Radiography.
What about the school holidays? Good question. I spent most of my time catching up with movies, games and the occasional game of basketball with the local kids. What about sleep? Even now, I can't sleep in unless I force myself to stay up, which is useless because I still end up sleeping the average 5-6 hours a day.
I stay up late because I just want time by myself to do the things I want to do, such as play a video game, blog or watch something. I can only do this at inappropriate times of night because that's when people are fast asleep or have established that at such times it is socially unusual to contact people. It's my rebellious way of saying "fuck you Saturday, I'll still end up having time to myself, no matter what I do during the day." Though it is becoming quite old-fashioned and immature, I am still gripped with the decision despite the exhaustion.
But then again, I'm not the kind of person to sit still. So if I did ever take time off, I would find a reason to wake up early and do something to make myself useful, to use the privilege of having a day to spare wisely.
Please enjoy your weekends and rest assured. As much as I am complaining, I too enjoy my Saturdays.
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