i like medical dictionaries

i used to think i was a pretty normal kid, but now looking back at my childhood, i'm realizing there were a couple of warning signs that should have told me that i probably thought a little differently than the other children. for instance, the first cd i ever owned was "now in a minute" by donna lewis. seriously? i think just me (age six) and just two strung-out preteen girls drained from crying over "sixteen candles" were the only people who bought that cd. but then again, my brother's first cd was ricky martin, so i mean you tell me who was the weird one. i was also in gt (gifted and talented), which is like the elementary school equivalent of mensa, except with none of the perks and all of the societal scorn. we got to play fun games like "piece the fake pterodactyl skeleton back together" and "do a stupid project over rosie the riveter," but we were allowed to skip science class for gt, so that was pretty cool, if a little bit illogical.

hooowweeever, since there were other kids in it too, i never really felt like an outsider, but i'm pretty sure i can say i was the only one in my class who religiously read medical dictionaries. okay, maybe not religiously, because that's just dumb, but i loooved them. still do. there was something so exciting and thrilling hidden behind the lines of minute text describing the procedure for curing a bone cyst (you have to scrape the cyst and fill the cavity with bone chips!) and the old black and white pictures of goiters and impetigo (fluid-filled blisters that burst and form pale-brown crusts). delightful!

(goiter)

(impetigo)

i loved pulling down my dad's old copy of the american medical association: encyclopedia of medicine and just thumbing through the pages, savoring words like "lymphogranuloma venereum" and "hydatidiform mole" and the way they felt in my mouth (the words, not the moles). so, when i got some money (thanks grandma), i bought my first medical dictionary at age like eleven or something. i read it all the time, and used the knowledge i gained from it to make a hilarious birthday card for my friend (outside: "happy birthday!", inside: "aren't you glad you don't have vitiligo?!"). comedy gold.

(vitiligo. not even joking. it's science. p.s. rip)

but really, it might just be that i have a sick obsession with like, weird stuff. i'm not sure. all i know is that my love for medical dictionaries has translated over to a particular fondness for medical dramas (but not grey's anatomy. the only thing medically wrong with anybody on that show is an unfortunate inability to portray actual human beings), and a desire to like, clean everyone's wounds. and i don't mean that in the normal, compassionate metaphor way. totally mean it in the weird way.

but i guess on the plus side of all this, if anyone i know ever contracts erysipelas, i'll know what to do.