The other night, my E.S. and I had dinner with N. and A., a lesbian couple who are friends of mine. E.S., who is a medical student, and N., who is not but who is interested in medicine, got into an involved conversation about medical school. They talked about E.S.’s current rotation, which is at a substance abuse treatment center, and the kind of work he wants to do once he’s a full-fledged psychiatrist. He’s not so interested in sit-on-my-couch-and-tell-me-about-your-mother psychiatry; instead, he wants to work in hospitals, helping people who are really, really crazy. That is, until he reaches his eventual goal (after a stint in Doctors Without Borders), which is to run a gay community health center.
I sat there and thought, I spend all my time with theater people, who are the most self-involved people on the face of the earth. And here you are, making a life out of helping others.
I felt so damn proud of him I could hardly stand it.
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