Hanging with classmates & the reason I'm not in philosophy school

All names used with permission!

Today I met Brooke (OTS) at school so we could drop off some paperwork in preparation for beginning classes next week. Then I picked up Virginia (OTS) and we headed to Brooke’s house to go to lunch and go swimming at her apartment’s pool. Afterwards, we played online and hung out. It was really fun. Tomorrow Brooke & I are going to help document feeding behaviors for a feeding group at a local children’s hospital, then print out a bunch of syllabi for our upcoming classes in the computer lab. THEN we are headed to Virginia’s birthday lunch which will be composed entirely of OT girls! We aren’t even in school and we can’t stay away from each other! After that I’m probably going to go do my monthly volunteer shift at another hospital (primarily database entry for Rehab). And then I’m meeting a friend for dinner and to play a really bad game of tennis before I start my late-night work shift. Should be a busy but fun day.

I really like the idea of getting to spend quality time with some of my in-town classmates this week, and I can’t even remember what I used to do before they were in my life! I really like that we can all be like-minded in our pursuit of a healing profession like OT, yet have diverse interests within the field. Brooke is really fascinated at the idea of working with people who have eating disorders, and she also wants to do a fieldwork in England! (Hey all you UK bloggers, any ideas on good placements?!) Virginia is really interested in community OT, with particular interest and compassion for the homeless. And I’m primarily interested in pediatrics (but not school-based), but mental health & hands appeal to me on some level as well. I know some girls in my class already swear they want to work with geriatrics. Others swear they want to go into hands. Or physical dysfunction. We are all trying to keep an open mind, but I think we all definitely have some personality traits that endear us to certain populations. One of my favorite things about OT as a profession is that there is this “confined diversity”.

So…how to explain my concept of confined diversity. Ok. A lot of people go to school a long time and get a degree at a graduate level, but then STILL have no idea what they are going to do with their degree (like almost any liberal arts-related degree). Getting a Master’s in OT is a little different though – we know we’re almost certainly going to be occupational therapists. There isn’t so much fear in graduation because our outcome is a little bit more specific. Yet it’s not stifling to know we have one profession in mind, because we have a trillion different populations to choose from within that profession, covering the entire spectrum of human life. Too much freedom can be intimidating, yet too little freedom induces claustrophobia. OT gives us the best of both worlds!

There’s my rather shallow philosophical thought for the night. What can I say, I’m not Karen Kierkegaard…
(although,umthepictureIincludedisofaswirling
vortexmarblemymomhadinCaliforniaandIthinkitsreallylike,
Idontknow,deepofmetoincludethisparticularpicturewiththis
postitjustseemssofittingbutitsbeatingadeadhorsewithastick
towriteaboutwhyIpickedthispicturewhichiswhyImdoingitlikethis
becauseitskindalikesublimalandsoyouneverreadthisright).

Ahem. Good night.

Jul 03, 2007 | Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none