Boards over! As evidenced in the sudden increase of free tables in coffee shops. Just four years ago (nostalgia, nostalgia, annoying nostalgia, as if it were 80 years ago) at around this time I was quietly squirming and saying of course I wouldn’t pass the bleeping exam, how the heck should I know that a cracked egg is… come to think of it, I still don’t know what the heck a cracked egg is, I’m still not sure if it’s classified as rots, spoiled, or sots, and what the fuck is sots anyway, it could have been a typographical error and was actually “spots”, but given the nature of the exams, for all we know it was really meant to be typed as “snots”, or maybe “norepinephrine”. You just never know, you would need double-barreled telepathic abilities to read what the examiner AND the typist were thinking to get the answers right.

Smoketh and I had agreed before the exams that should we ever fail we would go straight to Enchanted Kingdom and ride the roller coaster 20x till we pass out. We would then wake up and say “Oh it was just a dream, I actually passed,” and then we would realize that it wasn’t and we would ride again, pass out, wake up, think it was just a dream, realize it wasn’t, etc. We passed, so no cinematic rollercoastering happened, but it was a torturous three days of waiting characterized by nervous ritualistic nail-biting, hair-pulling, and self-mutilation.

I’ve learned of the results one night in a very uncinematic way–Abby Puzon texted me, I told my mom, and we all jumped in glee, and this time I’m not exaggerating–we actually jumped. Meanwhile at the Hall of Justice, Smoketh was in the backstage of some concert hall about to perform some choir song, when she got the news. She went into status epilepticus and had to be dragged into the Neuro ICu, or so I think. Enjh/Frichmond was in Starbucks, she screamed, and one of the first people to congratulate her was the Starbucks guard who’ve watched them toil for nights on end. Thymes called up Bombo Radyo and asked who the top passers were. She was top 4 or something, the announcer told her, who then went on and said spontaneously on the air, “and now live on air, one of the topnotchers of the recent medical board exams!!!”

Of course we know what happened next. I fell asleep, woke up at 12 noon, and told myself in fear: now what.

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