it's really true

When I got back from Bolivia, I had this small package in the mail from Dr. Kahana's office:

I mean, how cool is our Program Director?!? And it's really true. There is no place like the University of Chicago and I'm going to dearly miss this place if I leave. IF. Such a small two-lettered word but such weight! The countdown to Match Day: 10 more days... and the more important countdown is to Scramble Day: 7 more days. But let's not think about that remote possibility.

I want to document... I'm not really *that* stressed out about it unless I start thinking about it and worrying about it and then I just want to cry. But the honest truth is that it's now out of our hands and whatever happens and wherever I end up, Life will go on, as it always does, and it will turn out okay, like it always has in the past. Fate. I almost don't want to know where I'm going... because after March 16th is when the Real Stress will be unleashed... I'll have to find an affordable safe apartment; I'll have to sign the contract for my first "job" (aka slave labor, euphemistically called Residency); I'll have to plan the Big Move, sell all my crap, find someone to take over my current apartment lease, and figure out a way to relocate my entire life. Talk about stressful, people. The real stress begins AFTER March 16th, not really before...

In the meantime, I'm enjoying myself and trying to spend as much time as possible with friends and loved ones. My old lab friend Martin was in town this weekend so I got to show off how wonderful Chicago is... This is an overall bad picture (courtesy of Armando) but you can sort of appreciate the grandeur that is the Palmer House Hilton! We did a walking tour of Culture and Commerce in Chicago. It was a cold cold day but we went inside lots of beautiful lobbies and marvelled at many interiors, as well as exteriors, like the Chicago Cultural Center and Marshall Field's. It was fun and educational, all rolled into one.