As many of you already know, I'll be quitting my job and starting school in California in the fall. I'm actually currently on my very last Meditech trip and have some reflections about my travels.
First I'll hit you with some statistics:
# of Months since I started traveling = 31 (this equals 2.5 years or ~910 days or ~750 work days or 130 weeks)
# of Trips I went on = 59 (would've been cool to hit an even 60...)
# of Days on the road = 230 (Not quite up to George Clooney standards)
# of States visited for work = 19 (Although my current state count is 35, now including WA :-)
# of Hospitals visited = 25
# of Airline miles = 103,439 (I approximated this value based on my frequent flyer miles from 4 different airlines)
Now that I've actually written it all out the numbers feel less impressive than I thought they'd be. Except for the airline miles, that one's pretty good. Or it would be if it were all on the same airline. A common question I've been asked lately is "Will you miss traveling?" and of course my answer is HELLS YES. That being said, the sentiment feels a little out of place so I put together a pro/con list of sorts to see if the data matches up.
Things I will Miss About traveling/my job in General: (for those Meditechers out there - please take note of my illogical use of capital letters)
1. Free coffee
2. Renting cool cars
3. Visiting friends in random places
4. Hilarious stupidity
5. Being able to avoid the grocery store
6. Running into people I know at the airport
7. Frequent flyer miles
8. Seeing obscure parts of the country
9. Cheap movies (In most of the midwest it's only $4 for a matinee as opposed to outrageous $11.50 Boston rate)
Things I Will decidedly Not miss:
1. Getting stuck at the airport
2. People who simultaneously think computers are magic, mind-reading robots, will cause their patients to spontaneously combust, and are empty black, plastic boxes. (It's a complicated emotion toward an inanimate object, no wonder OR nurses are such an interesting breed).
3. Spending countless hours stuck in a windowless room
4. Eating alone in restaurants
5. Living out of my suitcase
6. My heinous 50-mile commute
7. Sitting at a desk all day
8. Hotel internet and showers
9. Paying for an apartment I don't really get to live in
and The winner Is...? As you may have been able to deduce this is a very conflicted transition for me. One day I can convince myself that leaving this job is the best thing I've ever done and the next I'll be wondering why I ever wanted to leave. My love for travel is hugely tipping the scales on this one. I just keep telling myself that I am pursuing something I actually want to do. I have a feeling it's going to be a very different experience from this past one which was something I fell into and happened to be really good at.
Stay tuned for The Great Californian Adventure - Chapter 1: The Cross Country Drive
