fixed prosthodontics is in the bag! it went really well...hopefully that's a harbinger of what's to come. (i speak too soon!)

i really really really really really want to go carolling this christmas. i'm so excited! i got really excited listening to mariah carey's (yeah, her) all i want for christmas on radio last night....that's what i want to do. go carolling, see some movies (especially big fish), eat some delectables, and relax. oh, and i want to go skating. and skiing. and hang out with my dad.

i stole a globe and mail from the med school students (well, they were just lying there! and aren't they all on holiday?) this morning, and in the Lives Lived section of Facts and Arguments was the story of a man who had just died a month earlier, James Dinneen. It was written by his wife, and it was terribly touching - it entailed his spirit and how he lived and enjoyed life with his family before succumbing to leukemia, at age 31. He did all the things that typically bring the tear-jerker reaction to any person's eyes...he bought his dream luxury car, he went to basketball games, held dinner parties, ate in luxury restaurants even through his chemotherapy, went to the sars concert to see his favorite band, RUSH (though immunocompromised) - and he wrote his two children letters that they were to read on their 18th birthday...and before he died, he called each person important to him into his room, and told that person how he felt, why he loved them, how to move on...

it's so incredibly unfair that disease can take the carpet right from under your feet - a blood disease, for goodness sake. it's so irreconcilable - that he is gone, he ceases to exist, save in memories - and that i'm still here, writing exams. and during this time, we complain and complain, worry that we haven't memorized just one fact more, become selfish and start on the rounds of self-pity...when in fact, one should, or i wish I could, think larger than that, and be larger and better than that.

here's to.