We Are Who We Are

It's that time again! BToW!

"Your favorite thing about vet school. Or a specific disease/condition/subject that you found interesting."

Watch it now, I'm about to throw down more cheese than fried mozza sticks.

It's the people.

I have been continually amazed at the people I've met at vet school. From group study, gaming nights, extra-curricular club events, to people who give up their so very rare free time for causes like humane society fundraisers, teaching animal enrichment and spay/neuter days. Is everyone fantastic? No. But I never thought I'd get along as well as I do with such a huge number of diverse people. I have never been one to make friends easily. I was one of the weird kids in high school (go figure when you don't care about celebrities, dress gothic and 50% of the television you watch and music you listen to is in Japanese) and went to university with virtually shattered self confience because of it; so I never put myself out there and consequently, never really bonded to anyone in unversity either. I was terrified coming to vet school that I was leaving behind the few close friends I had.

I had nothing to worry about. My classmates are amazing. I am surrounded by science geeks, so we all have that in common. Hell, at winter break, I have to watch what jokes I make because my old friends just don't get it, as well as reminding myself that not everyone finds medical stuff cool. There's only a small subset of the general population that can relate to the annoyance of having a bloody 4x4 gauze stuck to your surgical glove. I find myself saddened at the idea of leaving all these people next year.

Not to mention the faculty. We are a small school, we get overlooked a lot, and lord knows, we're not perfect. But we really do have some amazing faculty. Award-winning faculty. They love their job, they love to teach and it shows. Sure, we have our handful of profs that we all wonder exactly how they ever got tenure. They stand out because they're not the norm though. I have professors who inspire me on an almost daily basis; they make me want to be better, not for the number on the test paper but for them.