The Last Last

Things are winding down here in New Haven. Actually, that’s not quite true. Winding down implies a slow and steady decrease in pace. This was more like a frenetic dash through calendar days until suddenly... there’s nothing left to do.

We sold our house. We went to Texas and bought a new one. I gathered multiple documents and applied for my for-real-grown-up-doctor medical license. We packed up and moved our belongings. I went to the Pediatric Academic Society meeting in Hawaii to interview for the Pediatric Scientist Development Program. I studied for (and passed) the Texas Medical Jurisprudence exam. I worked long into the night making and editing our final residency class skit. I went to my graduation dinner (skit a huge success, thank you very much). I found out that I was awarded a PSDP grant.

Now I find myself vaguely blue, or at the least sentimental. It’s not that I’m not ready to move on with life. I most assuredly am, and will be glad to be done with residency. It’s just that our time here has been so filled with change and intensity. Despite how ready I am to be done there’s this angle of bitter-sweetness or melancholy that I can’t seem to shake.

I’ve been ticking lasts off of a mental list. Last call night. Last day on the wards. Last ED shift. Last night in the first house we owned. Last visit to restaurants we like. Last time I’ll see this friend or that attending. Last end of the year dinner. Last night with Julia and Grace in New Haven. Soon last continuity clinic and last night of pager call. After that, last day of residency. Then... what? I get in a car with the dog and drive out of town. And somewhere in there is the last last. At some point I have to stop counting lasts and start counting firsts.

One Man and a baby

OK, toddler. Due to the recent sad events in Julia’s family, she’s off to be with her family for the weekend. This means it is Grace and me (and the dog) left to our own devices for two days.

So far things have been pretty good. When she woke up this morning to find that Mommy was gone there was a period of 10-15 minutes of pouting, not wanting to be in the same room as me, etc. We got over that pretty quickly though, and things have been pretty smooth since. We have come to terms with the fact that “Mommy on plane, see Nana and Granddaddy” although we’ll see how that goes tonight.

Lunch was a fun experience. Grace has been on quite the non-eating kick of late. We had a showing of the house at 11:00 this morning, so after some frantic house cleaning, bathing, snow shoveling and dog walking we jumped in the car to go to a local burger/hot dog joint. Two weekends ago the three of us went there to be out of the house when people came to see it, and at that point Grace was very into french fries. I thought perhaps I could capitalize on this to get her to eat something. It worked! Well, sort of. She greatly loved dipping french fries in ketchup. She also loved sucking the ketchup off of the fries. Eating the fries? Not so much. There were some solid (albeit not the most healthy) calories consumed though. Afterwards we got a cup of chocolate ice cream. Gracie devoured it. By which I mean she devoured it the way a glacier devours a mountain range. I might have saved us both some time and just acquired a milkshake. But, by the time she was done converting herself into a messy chocolate monster it was time for us to go back home, so I can’t complain.

Some other things I’ve learned this afternoon:

• Grace lies. She will tell you she wants to go upstairs and go night-night at nap time. Do not believe her.

• Grace hates Guitar Hero and Rock Band. I’m not sure why, but something about that guitar controller sets her off. Needless to say, I won’t be making much progress this weekend on either game.

• Grace has a renewed love with keys. Every infant loves to jingle them around. Now that she’s figured out what they’re for, she goes around sticking my keys into everything: door knobs, cabinet pulls, DVD players. Some of these tolerate unlocking better than others.

• Grace is a harsh music critic. Guitar Hero aside, she also makes amazing snap judgements on whatever music we’re playing on the stereo. Within about two notes on some songs she will loudly declare “no like song” followed imploringly by “diffint song”.

So far so good though. I may be singing a different tune if I can’t get her to bed until 10:30 or something, but I choose to be optimistic. Now I have to run, before Grace tries to unlock the dog or something.