Yo estoy avergonzada.

Over the past week or so, I've had a couple experiences of positive reinforcement.  For example, finding out I passed my test is one such experience.  And,I've felt a little weird about it.  I'm not used to it.  Over the past couple of years, there hasn't exactly been a whole lot of external positive reinforcement for me to work with.  Even now in "interview season" I get a steady flow of daily rejections from programs.  It's about 1-2 rejections a day.  Can one get used to rejection?  I'd venture to say, desensitized at least.  When it becomes the usual, just another fact of life.  You learn to instead focus on the steady beat of eagles wings.  So then when you get some physical feedback that says, 'hey good job there!', or 'hey someone liked what you did there!'  I was feeling rather wary of just why I'd get so much suddenly.  I actually took a short time out this morning at the hospital to have a heart to heart with God.  To let Him know that I needed to be brought back down quick as I was in danger of getting a big head.  And I chuckled to myself getting back to the work at hand because I knew what was bound to happen sooner or later, and I was curious to find out just exactly how He would do it.
If I had guessed how it would happen, I would have guessed Dr. A.  And I would have been right.  There was a research meeting this afternoon, for which I'd had to quickly put together an abstract for one of my projects.  When the conversation of the meeting turned to focus on the project, Dr. A picked up my abstract expressing, "What the #*!@#$%^!* is this!"  You could hear a pin drop. Slowly all eyes turned to stare at me. And instantaneously I could feel the burn all the way to the tips of my ears.  Ooooo boy was he Ticked. Off.  Picking up papers and throwing them on the ground, cussing up a storm and everything.  He hadn't actually read my abstract, but I hadn't put any numbers in it, which he could see by glancing at it.  Now, I have many many many numbers in the data that I've collected and reviewed.  So much so that the tables I've organized them in are really rather large.  And in keeping an abstract to one page I opted to leave them out.  So, there's no numbers in the abstract.  So, he threw a fit right there in the meeting.  And all one can do is sit and let it blow over.  But hey, nothing like a heaping helping of public humiliation to deflate one's ego right?  Plus, I've learned a lesson.  Never give anything to Dr. A unless it has numbers in it. 

Hasta!