Why Med School Doesn't Want Me
The guy next to me in the photo is a man named John Tanksley. He is a medical student and also my main man. We have known eachother since we were 10. He is the kind of guy whose appartment is completely color-matched. He cleans his bathroom every day. He makes his bed. He has bottles of wine and champagne laying around "just in case." He shaves his chest. He's kind of a metrosexual.
But that is all irrelevant to the topic at hand, which is this: I am completely ineligible for medical school.
This came about recently as I pondered this fact: John will finish medical school in 2007, make about $40,000 a year while in residency (3 years, I think), then start pulling $150,000-$300,000 a year.
By 2011, he will have earned something like $220,000. By 2011 (assuming a normal sportswriter's salary), I will have earned something like $120,000. By 2021, he will be in the $2.3 million career earnings range. I will be in the $450,000 career earnings range.
So I asked him, "Say, uh, John, say I decided to take a year and study like a fiend for the MCATs. What are the chances I could get into medical school?"
John: "What, you're thinking about med school?!"
Tully: "I'm just wondering."
John: "Mmmm. Not good."
Me: "What if I got a really good score?"
John: "Well, they look at lots of other factors like GPA, and extra-curriculars. Plus, you have to be able to show them things you've done that indicate compassion."
Me: "Oh. I'm pretty much compassionately bankrupt, and my GPA is horrendous."
John: "Yeah. I don't think anybody would accept you. Unless you were black or something."
So there went that. Not that I was really considering it. Med school sounds like a lot of really boring work, and a lot of detail and a lot of debt. I don't think I would make a good doctor. And I like the career I've chosen. But it would have been nice to know that I still had some options. Turns out, if I had wanted to go to medical school, I basically would have started preparing for that when I was about 16, which is what John did.
So that's kind of a bummer.
On the bright side, I see 300-pound men naked on a regular basis.
3 comments:
Ok, I oversimplified John's statement on being black. BTW, I didn't realize you had a PR degree. 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009? Med school takes five years?
It appears I have been served. I will now lock myself in my room with a gallon of Ben & Jerry's and a fifth of Wild Turkey and stay there all weekend.
Tully, this is some funny stuff. Sportwriter? You should be writing comedy for (insert favorite sketch comedy show here that's not Saturday Night Live which is dead).
And not that it would make you feel any better, but medical school probably wouldn't accept me, either. I had to get my degree from Friends University of Central Kansas. But when you're old like me, they let you do that...and I still have loans to pay off...
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