and life swept on

I'm not even really sure where to start.  I've been so absent here that thinking of writing again makes me feel like I am decades late for an assignment and I just want to close the book and pretend it doesn't exist.  I've done so many things since I last wrote here, tiny miniscule things, and great big adventures.  My work life changed dramatically, and I am about to fully realize that change next tomorrow.  I took time off to travel, and explore, and celebrate a year of marriage to my sweetheart.  I enjoyed summer, and visits from family and friends. It's all the things and I don't know where to start.

So let's start with the basics, what do you do for a living?  After struggling with the decision for quite sometime, and chasing down many different paths, I gave my job my two months notice. (Side note, two months?! Apparently that's standard in my industry...doesn't that seem like forever? A very long, awkward, drawn out, forever?)  I am leaving family medicine and moving to an urgent care associated with the big hospital network in my area. It's a good change in many ways, though scary, and seemingly momentous for me.  I don't particularly like change, because it takes away my control, but I think it's good to let go of that a little especially when you find that a big part of not wanting to change is just fear of the unknown. I don't want to be a person who makes choices based on fear.

Leaving family medicine was hard. I think I was finally getting it. Not the medicine, for better or worse I think I've hit some small kind of stride in that regard, but the actual field itself.  Family medicine.  It's hard because it encompasses everything, it's difficult to get new grads into because there are so many other specialties that have more prestige or more money or more something else.  But I was starting to understand some of why my dad loves this field.  I was reaching the continuity part where I had been seeing my patients for over a year, and the visits were actually more like 'check ins' instead of frantic 'trying to learn your whole medical history' visits.  I could picture faces to names now, and could tease some people when I knew I was telling them something they weren't happy to hear, because I knew they personally would appreciate it. I found family medicine difficult for many reasons, most of them bureaucratic, and too exhausting to get into.

But, I won't have to restlessly and wildly speculate for much longer as I start on Monday.  And since I've had a month off to wipe the slate clean, and find some of my old self again, I should most definitely be ready.  Right? Right.

Anyway, I'm hoping to bring writing back into my life. Writing and picture sharing.  Here's hoping I can do it.