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[biochemichael]

Antsy (day 2)

(Okay, so this was technically almost a week ago now but whatever)

So I was sitting at my desk the other day after finishing up a day of relatively productive work... or as much work can be considered productive while I’m waiting to start my job soon. And then all of a sudden, the human equivalent of zoomies took over my head. This happens to me occasionally. Except for me, it’s usually a manifestation of me not feeling fulfilled in some way, or me looking back and realizing I can fit something more into my day. Or because I’ve been cooped up inside all day. Or I suppose it could be a way to express anxiety (must look up theories into behavioral impetuses for zoomies in animals).

My boyfriend is honestly too patient with me when I have these moments. In his shoes, I might just suggest a walk around the block, or grabbing a quick dessert down the street from our apartment. At least, those were the solutions I figured he’d agree with the most and what I offered to him (I even threw out the idea of going to a trampoline park, but he quickly crashed that high). But he offered to let me drive around downtown Chicago, since that’s worked in the past. I always have some grand idea of taking the city by storm whenever I drive around at night. The skyline, the lights, the opportunities - seems like a perfect cure to daytime ennui and unfulfillment. But usually we end up just getting an ice cream or something (forever grateful for you, Shake Shack).

Maybe it’s because of FOMO, or because I’m now cooped up with my boyfriend for around 12 hours a day and need another diversion, but I reached out to a friend who will be leaving for Hawaii in a couple days. I’ve known her since undergrad and we’ve had this unspoken agreement that we will be friends no matter what. Not really sure how that started, but I honestly don’t question it too often anymore. I haven’t really had that relationship with too many people from my younger years, either due to me not reaching out as much as I should to maintain a connection during my adult life or due to lack of mutual interest in continuing communication. I usually chalk this up to my own belief that I’m not interesting or funny or someone worth talking to too much. But my friend, she really knows how to open you up conversationally. Otherwise, I might be content with sitting in my apartment all day in front of a screen or a book most days if I’m not forced (either through internal or external forces) to get off my ass once in a while.

But I guess that’s not how I was feeling yesterday. In the most basic of synopses, we all drove around various neighborhoods of Chicago (River North, Boystown, Lincoln Park, Old Town, Wrigleyville), stopped and got ice cream (oops, fell back into our ways), and went back home. However, there was more. When we stopped at the local ice cream store (where we all chickened out on ordering the overpriced funnel cake sundae), we opined back and forth about which recent SNL skits were the most indicative of our high school selves. We drove past many a gay club in Boystown and were surprised at the return of club life amidst a pandemic (but not really). On the drive through Old Town, there were religious fanatics standing at the corner McDonald’s; our friend decided that would be a perfect time to sing “Our God is an Awesome God'' in a near falsetto with the windows rolled down. 

Looking back on the drive, we were all just doing a bunch of mundane shit that could’ve happened via FaceTime or text or whatever. Really, I most likely just needed a change of scenery. But I do know that this brief outing would be something that we’d all cherish, considering the transiency of the situation that we had to confront. Scratching an itch is much easier when you don’t have to fly almost 9 hours across 5 time zones to do so. Considering the fact that days spent inside tend to bleed together, maybe I should get outside more often and listen when my gut tells me to look away from the screen every now and then. Or maybe I just need to find more interesting indoor hobbies.

Anyway, here’s to zoomies. And ice cream.

[biochemichael]

Intro (day 1)

Hey folks! My name’s Mike, and I’m a newly-degreed physician assistant who is still finding himself - aka, I’m immediately questioning whether defining myself in my first sentence is enough to capture who I am. But, as sort of an intro to who I am and as a reminder to myself, I wanted to break down some of my “features” in a convenient list for any and all interested parties. Likes:

Film and related criticism

Cooking (and realizing that cooking isn’t as easy as just following a recipe)

Trampoline parks

Learning new activities and information

Playing the piano (even though I’m not good at it)

Dislikes:

Not being extremely proficient in most hobbies I have started by now

Knowing that I’ll need to put in practice to actually get good at these things

Feeling stagnant, less competent than others, or like I’m wasting time

Being alone with my thoughts

Addressing my insecurities

Even while writing this relatively simple post, my mind’s been all over the place. I’ve opened around 10 tabs dealing with a bunch of other random tasks that I should take care of (a jurisprudence exam for PA licensure; onboarding paperwork for my new job; searching Reddit for different communities of hobbyists; etc), did an apartment search, traveled all over the state, and so on… which all took about a day to get through. I don’t think Tumblr will necessarily fix that, but I guess it’s necessarily a problem to be fixed. I’ve got a lot of things I want to do and learn and be at least somewhat successful at, and I really want to practice wrapping my head around them all while keeping myself sane and organized.

I may be a few years late to this whole Tumblr thing. I feel like I’ve been late to a lot of things that have sort of held me back in general. My goal is to interact with more people, make a few friends, make some mistakes, feel like an idiot, explore my interests, and spice up my life a little bit. I’ll try and do something impressive from time to time, and I’m still figuring out what specific sequence of events or tasks I need to do to address most of the dislikes I mentioned above. We’ll see what happens. Thanks for reading.