holiday cheer

24

I was on duty on Christmas Eve. What should’ve been a much needed time with family turned out to be a slow night on OB duty. Noche Buena was cold Chicken McNuggets meal. Not that it would’ve been much different if I weren’t on duty. I stocked up for a lonely Christmas with whole wheat cereal and a liter of non-fat milk only.

As Christmas day approached I chose to isolate myself in the empty labor room and sleep. I would’ve slept until morning if I hadn’t been awakened by a resident who was looking for drinking buddies. I wasn’t really up to it, nor were my other co-interns. So wiping sleep from my eyes, I downed a couple of glasses of white wine (the bottle of Tequila had been emptied earlier) as the already drunk residents called every contact listed in their mobile phones and greeted each with a slurred “Merry, merry Christmas”.

25

I got home from the hospital around lunch on Christmas day and went straight to bed. I woke up minutes later too lazy to get up or go out. I ended up watching old ER episodes the whole afternoon.

26

The streets were almost empty the day after Christmas, the distance between cars measured in kilometers instead of the usual fraction of a meter. All I could say was, “it’s just another day on duty”.