for some bizarre, inexplicable reason, it struck me as a good idea to suddenly slack off twenty minutes before the self-imposed study curfew for correlative cell biology last sunday night and read my archived blog entries. while it may not have helped me distinguish stereocilia from cilia or learn the difference between the basement membrane and basal lamina, the brief respite proved to be just the mood booster i was looking for.

it was really such fun looking back on events in my life and seeing my past self's literary take on matters trivial and otherwise. luckily, being a college freshman that time provided me *some* degree of emotional stability and maturity. i might have died right then and there if i had peeked at my past entries and found a teeny-bopper juvenile's incessant whining and mindless prattle concerning irrelevant nothings. oh yes, i do whine and prate over certain trivialities (case in point: right now), but never in a juvenile way.

even more fun was realizing how dorky i blogged and how childish my writing seemed to be a few years ago (is there *really* any difference? you be the judge), and trying to imagine how i could have let myself run rampant in that forgettable phase of social-netting suicide for so long. imagine, smileys in my entries?! but at the very least, that quintessential dash of flowery flair and wizardly wordplay for which my writing is *so infamously* known for was present even since then, giving me something positive to look back on (the chronic ego inflation is apparently a recent development).

but what struck me the most was the stark difference between my views on my past experiences then, and as i'm looking back on them now. honestly, i remember ranting back then that that was the worst stress and pressure i've ever felt in my life, and that that was a valid emotion during that time. but as we continued on our path as imed, and now as medical students, i guess the same emotion just kept on resurfacing on every given opportunity, me being sure that whenever that moment was and however i felt then was the worst i could ever feel. and now, after having gone through organic chem and embryology and just recently our first anatomy lab exam, i think i've adopted the same cynicism and dry sarcasm as everyone else who went through the same stuff, or even worse. it's like i keep on swearing that this is the worst it could get, but then life stabs me in the back and presents me with yet another more *challenging* situation. if anything, that's something i can be sure of; med school never fails to deliver the good stuff.

at least by this time, i've learned that life rarely gets any easier, we just learn to cope with it and to shift it to our advantage. along with accepting that fact comes the slight twinge of irritation i now feel whenever anyone, my past self included, unaware of that truth comes along and complains about what they're having trouble with right then, not realizing that there will *always* be something worse coming up along the way, and that they should be thankful that that's all they have to handle in their lives. like i said, the juvenile-ness of it all just makes me want to roll my eyes and share knowing looks with people in the same stage i am (knowing looks being something i have become adept with over the sems).

but what the heck, they (past self included) don't know any better. i could be kind enough to let them pass with a little laugh and the generic answer "hintayin nyo lang pag dating nyo sa proper. tapos hihilingin nyo na sana nasa first year lang kayo ulit" or something like that. along with all that plastic crap will come the prayer that someday, they too will realize that no amount of whining will change the fact that things will get tougher as they go along, and that someday they too can look back at their past personas and roll their eyes in sarcastic frustration.