Why am I here, not there?

Michelle will be graduating from high school this year,  a 17 year-old girl with your dream-of perfect model curves and height, and probably the girl next door with an immense teenage dream to fulfill. She would propose a friendly debate whenever we talk. My nerve impulses do not travel the speed of her brains to sort out what her subsequent responses are before I realized her monotonous speech bombarded my senses. She is a smart girl. That is the only phrase I could frame to describe her intelligence after running through a list of vocabularies from my dictionary. All along, I thought she would make a good lawyer, an outstanding one. That word which spells W-H-Y, terminated with a question mark is her favorite. I wouldn't be astonished to know a girl at her age with an average curiosity to beseech this straightforward yet knotty question. In fact, many questions she inquired were not to my knowledge. This missy whom I watch her grow from a cute little infant to now, a beautiful young lady is ready for her next chapter of life. It is high time for her to decide what she wants to do.

Being the eldest daughter of a reputable and well to do family, with both her parents working as doctors, norm would tell you Michelle will be going into the same line. By tradition, a family of professional vocation grooms generations of the same profession. If not many, at least one down the line. Michelle is blessed with both her parents being very thoughtful and lenient towards her and Naomi. There was a day when this girl who is still indecisive about her future being questioned by her father about her ambition. Wow, ambition. A cherished desire that is tricky to define, yet it defines your future with a vague paradigm you regard as model as you move towards the final destination and propel to achieve it.  

"Michelle, it's time for you to start thinking what you want for your future. What will you like to be?". "I don't know", the girl replied with such a familiar innocence of an unframed picture about her ambition. Daddy asked again, "Do you want us to decide for you, or you do it yourself?". "You all decide for me". "Alrighty. How about being a lawyer?". "Don't want!", the girl protested with affirmation, giving an excuse that she hates reading the subject of History. "Then, accountant?". "Don't want!", again she protested again. This time with a justification that she does badly in Mathematics. "How about engineering?". "Don't want either. I dislike Physics!". "Then what do you want? You told us to decide for you, but you oppose every suggestion given. Or you want to be an architect?". This 17 year-old whom we figured had no plans about her future, rejected every choice given to her with proper reasoning and dislikes. "I think becoming a doctor will be a better choice", she acknowledged in the end.

The conversation ripped me off my defense and made me ponder on the reason to why I am here today, here in medical school. Deep inside me, Michelle ruffled a familiarity, a mirror image of myself when I was at her age. I must confess that I preempted myself into this profession with a notion set in a similar frequency as hers, I presume. Nothing to my interest besides human and humanity. I don't really know why I am here. Once upon a time, I was pretty much inspired by those serial medical dramas I watched, and partly because I couldn't find myself doing any other jobs but saving lives. The latter reason would have made more sense, but as time goes by, I realize there are many fields out there which I favor and the compassion to save lives is almost fading as it begins to get worn out. Now that I'm into the actual life of a student who slogs and mugs, such dramas and documentaries do not appear cool to me anymore. If only I were to rephrase Michelle's favorite question to 'Why do I like medicine?', I wouldn't have joined med school. There is not even a subtle reason that explains why I am here, hurdling the multiple stressors that seems too futile for strivings, only to realize I'm competing with millions of doctors out there for a job which may not have vacancy in time to come. New diseases are erupting, the sick is suffering and people are dying, yet I no longer show empathy like before. For everyday has become a routine and when things get routinized, they get boring. The care I tried to give now has become a sympathy. Allowing myself to feel from someone else's shoes is simply a chore I'm feeling every now and then. Or am I getting callous about situation after four years of exposure?

There's no way I could reverse time and take a new path which might again taste foreign to me after some time. I'm almost there at the finishing line after four years of hard work. It would be a lie if I tell you I paid no effort. The line is nevertheless so faint, I could hardly catch a glimpse. The collection of 'Why did I choose to be a doctor?' that has come from everyone who thinks the same, I guess we can only answer that for ourselves because none can be held responsible for giving an indefinite answer. We know ourselves best. For even if we meet a blind end after plunging into the deepest corners of our hearts searching for an answer, a final reply to that question is up to us to judge whether or not it is satisfactory and to finally place a full stop to it. If we keep probing, there will be no end. A friend once said, 'We will find that peace when we know that the answer has now reach the level of the unseen world, where God is.' 

By the way, Michelle is my lovely cousin. (: