Visit To New York City

Me and my niece. I spent the night in New York city on my way to California. It was great to have a chance to catch up with my sister and aunt (who was also visiting) and play with my niece, who is at a very cute age where she likes to imitate much of what you do. I'm wearing a purple superwoman cape that I had as a kid that now belongs to Talia. You might note the black eye, she fell on the corner of the scale at the midwife's office. Nothing that won't heal.


Below: My sister and Talia. Like mother like daughter! Debating what to order.

Block 4: Peace Out!

My semester is almost over! I finished block 4 today. The final exam consisted of two 8 hour written exams, given on back to back days (well, technically 9 hours since they were 8-5 but they expect you to eat lunch and take occasional breaks). Typical Cornell. Parts of it were hard and parts of it I knew really well. Yesterday was better than today. When I picked up the second section of the exam at nine a.m. today (it's case based and so is given in sections and you pick up the next section when you turn in the previous one, complicated, I know) I realized I had no idea how to answer several of the questions. So I lay down on the comfortable black couch in the library and took an hour nap (aside: we can take the exam anywhere in the veterinary college, we're on the honor code not to cheat, it's a nice system and I think cheating is quite rare). I mean, I had all day. I had tried napping the previous day during the afternoon but couldn't fall asleep. Unfortunately for my classmate hard at work at the table next to me, I snore, an embarrassingly unfeminine trait.
At any rate, I woke up without having had any flash of inspiration, sadly, but much less anxious. And I still finished the exam with half an hour to spare, at 4:30 p.m.
Block 4 has the reputation of being the hardest semester in vet school. It was a lot of hours sitting in lecture and a lot of memorization but I can honestly say I found it quite interesting and mostly enjoyed it. Except for immunology. Frustratingly, I continue to find immunology to be confusing. I'm planning to read some immunology over break to see if I can begin to consolidate what I learned this semester.
One more exam, in parasitology, and then I'm done and I can get out of here, head to New York city and from there to California. YAY!
It feels good to be almost done but I'm also exhausted and my brain feels like silly putty (perhaps someday I can turn that into a poem).

Cornell University Hospital For Animals On Television

There will be a segment filmed in the CUHA on television tonight:

For everyone who is an American Chopper fan (or a CUHA supporter!), we hope you will tune into American Chopper on Monday, December 13, at 9pm. We believe that the Cornell University Hospital for Animals will be included in a segment on this Monday’s episode of American Chopper on the Discovery Channel.

We expect that the episode will feature Gus, a bull mastiff who is the long-time companion of Paul, Sr. Gus was here this past summer for a procedure.

You can find a sneak preview at http://dsc.discovery.com/videos/american-chopper-sneak-peek/

You should definitely check it out as there is a lot of footage of my awesome advisor, Dr. Dan Fletcher.

Winter Jewels

Normally she spends her time outside looking up, scanning subconsciously for birds. This morning, taking out the kitchen scraps to the compost pile, she has to watch her step so as not to slip on the hidden steps and logs. On close inspection, the snow glitters in the wan winter sunlight, a blanket of hundreds of tiny sparkling crystals. She's never noticed this before, used to seeing snow reflecting sunlight as one large blinding flash of light, ecstatic to discover so many jewels underfoot.

Winter Tomato

She buys the last container of green tomatoes of the year at the farmer's market. Her Thanksgiving attempt at fried green tomatoes ends up a gloppy mush of undercooked tomato, bread crumbs and egg whites. She puts the remaining ones in the refrigerator, forgets they are there until one day in December when she stumbles on a bright red tomato in the back corner of a shelf, as out of place as a hummingbird in snow.
She takes it out, cuts it up. The first bite of salty, meaty flesh brings back memories of summer, fresh succulent vegetables abundant. The gooey pulp of the inside a luscious cool wet aftertaste.

Winter Sun

Mid-afternoon, the sun already setting, one week until solstice.

The winter sun slants through the trees, casting long shadows. Walking up the stairs to her room, light illuminates the landing. Bright and airy, she can imagine for a moment it is summer, can imagine how the house will feel open and alive then. The problem with day after day of grey is that it starts to feel like it will be winter forever. She begins to believe she has imagined spring, imagined summer, that they are simply a figment of her overactive mind.

When her college roommate was ten months pregnant with her son, long overdue, she told her, 'I feel like I've always been pregnant. I can't even remember how it feels to not be pregnant.' She knows that once the sun goes down she too will forget the feel of summer, forget how it feels not to carry an extra weight, but for now she hold onto hope, sun soaked memories.
*

The next day is even sunnier, brighter than it has been in weeks. She exclaims to her friends, 'Look at how gloriously blue the sky is. I wish I could capture it and put it in a bottle, take it out and put it in my window at night to remind me what sun feels like.' They respond, 'How poetic.' The irony is she isn't trying to be poetic at all.

It's on days like this, when she feels her heart finally beginning to unclench and a surge of energy and enthusiasm rush through her, that she realizes she's only just surviving the rest of the time, on what she considers her 'good' days. Last winter she was moribund, limp, lifeless. The improvement between this year and last is the difference between sinking and treading water. She pictures a white-tailed kite, wings fluttering while it hovers in one spot like an oversized hummingbird.

Kite, n. lit. the hovering bird; a rapacious bird of the hawk kind: a rapacious person: a paper toy for flying in the air, so called for its flying like a kite. {A.S. cyta; W. cod; Bret, kidel, 'a hawk,' from cudio, to hover.}

She's neither soaring nor swooping downward, she's treading air, suspended in space.

We Interrupt The Creative Writing Program To Resume Memorizing: Systemic Infections Differentials

Cows:
A Big Brown Bovine And Ebullient Cow
Anaplasma marginale
Borrelia burgdorferi-- Lyme disease
Bacillus anthracis-- anthrax
Bovine viral diarrhea virus
Anaplasma phagocytophilum-- tick-borne fever
Ehrlichia ruminatum-- African heartwater disease
Chlamydophila pecorum

Horses:
A Big Brown Belgian Equine And Nervous Equine
Actinobacillus equuli-- sleepy foal disease, navel ill, shigellosis of foals
Burkholderia mallei-- glanders
Burkholderia pseudomallei-- melioidosis
Borrelia burgdorferi-- Lyme disease
Equine infectious anemia
Anaplamsa phagoctyophilum
Neorickettsia risticii-- Potomac horse fever
Eastern, Western and Venezuelan encephalitides

Swine:
My, My, My Holy Big Bad Francisella
Mycoplasma hyosynoviae
Mycoplasma suis
Mycoplasma hyorhinis
Haemophilus parasuis-- Glasser's disease
Burkholderia pseudomallei-- melioidosis
Bacillus anthrax-- antrhax
Francisella tularensis-- tularemia

Sheep and Goats:
A Big Bad Crop And Bold Francisella
Anaplamsa ovis
Burkholderia mallei-- glanders
Burkholderia pseudomallei-- melioidosis
Chlamydophila pecorum-- stiff lamb disease
Anaplasma phagoctyophilum-- tick-borne fever
Francisella tularensis

Dogs:
Another Big Bad Neutered Rottweiler, Holy Infectious Crazy Canine Coccidiodes

Anaplasma phagocytophilum
Borrelia burgoderferi-- Lyme disease
Blastomyces dermatitidis
Neorickettsia helminthoeca-- salmon disease, salmon poisoning disease
Rickettsia rickettsii-- Rocky Mountain spotted fever
Histoplasma capsulatum var capsulatum
Infectious canine hepatitis
Canine parvovirus
Canine distemper
Coccidiodes immitis

Cats:
Yucky Muddy Hissing Bad Fat Frowning Felines
Yersinia pestis-- plague
Mycoplasma haemofelis
Histoplasma capsulatumm var capsulatum
Burkholderia mallei-- glanders
Feline Leukemia virus
Feline panleukopenia
Feline acquired immunodeficiency virus

Birds:
My New Parrot Bird
Mycoplasma synoviae
Newcastle disease
Pastereulla multocida subspecies gallicida-- fowl cholera
Borrelia anserina

Zoonotic:
Yersinia pestis-- plague
Francisella tularensis-- tularemia
Burkholderia mallei-- glanders
Burkholderia pseudomallei-- melioidosis
Chalmydophila pecorum
Borrelia burgdorferi-- Lyme disease
Rickettsia rickettsii-- Rocky Mountain spotted fever
Bacillus anthracis-- anthrax
West Nile virus
Colorado tick fever

Wind

At night the wind knocks on her windows, softly, insistently first, then frustrated banging full force. Let me iiiiiin. Let me iiiiiiiiiiin. The old oak tree a low groan. The window panes shudder in their frames, no match for the onslaught. Ice cold drafts slip in through the cracks, uninvited, unwelcome.

There's something oddly comforting about staying up late studying, Simon on her lap, space heater emitting a seeping warmth, tucked in her tiny study nook jutting out over the house entrance. Starless cloudy pitch black night, waves of wind pummeling the house.

Later, trying to fall asleep, she lies in bed listening, wistfully wishing the wind was a person, a Romeo serenading her from below. She drifts off into fantasy, arms wrapped tightly around her blanket

Snow Globe, Magic

She's living in a snow globe. Turn the world upside down and presto-- there's mesmerizing swirling white confetti. Shake. Repeat. Day after day. Confined in a bubble. Same old scenery. Stock snowman, fir tree, gingerbread house. She's dizzy from being upside down, blood rushing to her head.
*
When she is three her mom tells her that Santa Claus doesn't exist. Jewish girls don't get presents for Christmas. She spins the dreidel and lights candles, trying hard to remember the words to the blessing from night to night. She thinks her friends are silly, believing that someone comes down their chimney overnight, but she keeps the secret to herself for years, until they finally figure out the truth.

The magic ended for her then. Later, she put lost teeth under her pillow so the Tooth Fairy could come and take them, but only because she wanted the dollar bill that she got in return. Her parents took the first tooth and put it in a cup of Coke. In the morning it was gone, not even a trace left behind. She stopped begging to be allowed to drink soda.

She discovers magic in nature, never ceasing to find wonderment in the metamorphasis of tadpoles. Staring at the embryos in their clear eggs under her kiddie microscope, watching them change hour by hour, wiggling in their jelly sacs. Wriggling free, so tiny. The limbs popping out, one by one. First a bump by the head, then suddenly, arm, complete with tiny webbed fingers, perfect. She knows that once she was a tiny embryo, tries to imagine herself as a tadpole, so hard to believe without a shred of memory of her watery beginnings.

She's jealous of her friend's daughter, Grace, six years old. She believes in Santa Claus but finds the thought of him coming down her chimney scary, begs her parents to cover the chimney. When she finds a necklace of fairy dust under the tree with the inscription "Follow your dreams," she's elated. Her friend, Katie, miraculously, received the same present, Grace tells her with amazement. Grace's imagination knows no bounds. Her mom straps a horn to Snowfall's head and her horse is instantly transformed into unicorn. The magic permeates the little girl's richly imaginative world, and although it is too late for her, she basks in Grace's joy.

Desire

Desire flits in and out of view, like a yellow warbler hopping among shrubbery. Just when you think you have bright plumage in focus with your binoculars, it alights, disappearing into thick underbrush. Rare winter migrant, passing through, passing interest. Women, half-imagined, daydreams, as elusive as the rarest of warblers.

One winter a storm blew in a flock of red phalaropes. Reversed sexual dimorphism. Pelagic. Halophilic. She found out too late about their arrival, they were already gone. Imagined.

In sea horses, males carry pregnancy. Reproductive reversal. Pipehorses. She's seen the leafy sea dragon in aquariums, camouflaged, delicate fronds slowly undulating underwater. She longs to be that delicate, unearthly gossamer tendrils floating lazily, seductive as a siren.

Time To Buy A Shovel; The Black Market in Lab Notebooks

So I know I've been missing in action for awhile. There's nothing really that interesting to report. I'm surviving. Studying, writing poetry, the usual. SmileySuperLesbian called me tonight and she asked what I was up to and I said, "you know, just taking my nightly bath with Parham." There was an awkward silence until it clicked for her that I was referring to our immunology textbook. Yes, folks, that is how exciting my life is-- I spend my evenings in a hot bath reading my textbook. Unfortunately, I'm not a huge fan of immunology. It's OK. If Boron was my boyfriend (meaning I really liked physiology and spent a lot of time with my books) then Parham is a casual acquaintance.

In other news, winter seems to have arrived in force today. We had our first snow that stuck of the year. While some people think this is beautiful and exciting, I find it rather depressing. I firmly believed it was just going to stay late fall forever, well, at least until spring arrived. Denial is a wonderful thing and worked well right up until the point I looked outside and saw everything covered in white fluff. Yuck.

I've been an embarrassingly bad student this semester. Not only have I slept through class for the first time in my life, I also skipped a class for the first time in my academic career this week. I did this on the same day that another classmate of mine skipped for the first time in her life as well. There's a first time for everything. Almost as scintillating as reading immunology in the bathtub.

In more bizarre news, I managed to lose my lab notebook for the SECOND time this semester. The first time I left it at a computer desk in the library and it never showed back up. After that I left it in my car for awhile and just used my lab partner's. Then I decided to bring it into lab to try to pull my weight and thought it would be a good idea to leave it in the drawer at my lab bench so I wouldn't lose it again. Presto, it disappeared. Magic disappearing act. Or maybe someone is selling them on the black market... because just this evening my lab partner sent out an email asking if anyone had accidentally picked up her lab notebook-- yes, hers has also mysteriously disappeared into thin air. That makes a total of three missing lab notebooks. And yes, they're good reading, but NOT that good. Of course lab is 15% of our final so we will both need to replace them somehow. And then guard them with our lives as they are apparently a hot commodity.

OK, that's all folks. Two weeks till finals and then I'm free for six whole weeks!