I know I have written several posts on how much my life has changed and that it is clear, by all accounts, that I am no longer the 21 year old college student my inner self still believes she is.
But a couple of things lately make me feel as if I may as well have one foot in the grave.
Saturday I went to a "party" for a good friend's 40th bday. I call it a "party" because it was a dinner with a couple of friends, which was awesome. But a major contrast to my 30th bday, with a big party at my house and even (cringing here) a keg and the police called by my neighbors. Anyhow, I had a great time at Robyn's dinner, and I would not have wanted to go to any wild parties- can't think of much less appealing now. First we went to Union in Encinitas. This is apparently a very cool and trendy place with lots of really good looking people. I was pretty horrified to be there and I really wanted to apologize for my presence (as in, "Yes, I realize I am at least 10 years too old to be here and I will be getting out of the way really soon, thanks"). I felt so much like the older sister in Knocked Up, when she goes to the bar with Allison and can no longer get past the bouncer. We only lasted 5 minutes at Union-- nowhere to sit, too loud, and we just wanted somewhere quieter so we could sit and catch up. Yes, I recall my mother saying similar things when she was about my age. So we headed south to L'Auberge. A very nice place, but much quieter. Grabbed a table by the fireplace overlooking the beach. Perfect.
So Robyn (the birthday "girl') and Colleen are friends from residency. Residency feels to me like it was maybe a few months ago. But no, have been out now for 7 years-- long enough that I do not know a single resident in the program, except those from my time that stayed on as faculty. Nope, don't know anyone, but according to Colleen, they are a very wild bunch-- lots of heavy partying and even cocaine use. I can honestly say I don't know a single individual (well, to my knowledge, at least) who uses cocaine. I've never even seen it, save for the 4% solution I used to use in the ER topically to stop nosebleeds. I always viewed cocaine as really bad, will-mess-up-your-life-forever-even-if -you-use-it-just-once-- like Len Bias who died after his "first time." I am not saying at all that I want to try cocaine-- nothing further from the truth, actually. But hearing about these people who seem to me like my peers (though they are probably 10 years younger so definitely not "peers") living this fast and crazy life makes me feel so disconnected to my residency days. And even when Colleen and Robyn were discussing a couple cases they have seen recently I realized that I am so of touch with clinical emergency medicine that I don't even know how to do the bread and butter procedures of my specialty any longer. They were talking about intubating with a Glideoscope-- I have never seen one and would have no clue what to do with it. So no, residency wasn't just a few months ago-- it was pretty much a whole lifetime ago. And though I keep up with the medical literature (ok, reality check, while I do the requisite CME to keep up my license, I spend most of my "educational time" on the message boards--- nothing like an online community of physicians as Saturday night entertainment), I am really out of touch.
And then tonight I was looking up an old friend from college-- someone I dated very casually many (OMG 18) years ago. Found him on the internet-- he is a professional musician so it wasn't hard. I last saw him 12 years ago, so it isn't like we are close, haven't even spoken in that interim. But still, I have an idea in my head of what he is like-- and it doesn't fit AT ALL with what he appears to be now. Why is this surprising-- I don't know-- I certainly have changed tremendously in 12 years. Now he has a food blog with incredibly ornate vegetarian recipes. First, didn't know he liked to cook-- and I don't remember him being vegetarian. Certainly could have been-- was a long time ago. He also had long hair- he doesn't now. I can't describe it-- I guess it is that even though I realize I have changed over the years, it makes me feel incredibly old to see other people so different from the way I remember them.
It is way too late now, and I really need to head to bed. But, to keep me honest, here is where I am in my training plan:
Week of June 12: 25 miles, and painful. Definitely not recovered from the marathon. Most runs I was just dragging
Week of June 19 (last week)-- 35 miles and much better. I know, I know, probably shouldn't have made such a large mileage jump, but workouts felt good and I ended up running an extra day.
This week: haven't run at all yet, last run was Saturday- today is Tuesday. Need to hit 28 miles (well, I did 2.5 m speedwork today so I guess not accurate to say I haven't run at all) I cross trained yesterday and did speedwork with my coach today which leaves me with 3 more days of running. Was going to stretch it out to 4 and have a Saturday run, but am going out to dinner with girlfriends on Friday, and as I just can't recover from drinking like I used to (again, because I am so OLD)-- I need to do it in 3.
Dragging my tired old self to bed...
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