dallas, texas

I have arrived in Dallas. I checked in, organized my room, spent the afternoon worrying about things I couldn't control, met my roommate and went to orientation.

first off: the big worry, the roommate, K, is fine. She seems really nice, is neat, and seems like she might be the type to study even more than I do. The only conflict I really see at this point is that she stays up later than i do. I will have to work on being such a light sleeper.

2nd worry: food. It is going to be fine. While I don't expect a lot of tofu in my future, I am assured that the veggies are steamed (mostly) and that there will always be rice or pasta (or something to that effect).

3rd worry: people. well... everyone seems to be from 2 schools in the Caribbean: ross and AUC, so they all already know each other. I think it will be okay - everyone seems nice, it will just take a while. I feel a bit odd being the only one from a US med school. I don't know if that is just snobbery, or what, but i imagine I will get over that pretty quickly.

The orientation was pretty scary. Our expectations for phenomenal scores (or mine at least) were pretty soundly dashed. We were told to expect only 20-40 points in improvement. I would really like more improvement than that... but, I also want to be realistic about my possibilities. It would seem a shame to take a year off and still just barely pass.

But, i need to start adjusting my attitude. I need to learn to be more positive, and to stop with all the doubting. That is an overarching goal of this journey.

We are told that the way to do this - to study, i mean - is not to take obsessive notes, and then copy them over and over again (as has been my habit), but rather to use our tape recorders to record ourselves reading the highlighted portions of our notes. Then we play the tape back while reading the highlighted portion of our notes. apparently this is a proven way... I will try it. The whole point of doing this program is to do things differently, to change the way that I learn, as what i was doing wasn't working, so that is what i will do.

i will let y'all know how it goes...