Recently, I took a few hours out of a Friday night as a study break and accompanied my girlfriend to the first night of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour at Lincoln Financial Field. I’ve only become a fan of Taylor’s within the last few years (thanks, in no part, to the efforts of my girlfriend), but her music has been a constant through much of my life. The aptly named Eras Tour does not focus solely on her latest album, but rather, samples all of her work throughout her now almost 20 year career.

The reason I even bring up my trip to the Eras Tour and Taylor Swift’s career is because I keep thinking about how quickly time has been passing for me. To age myself, her debut album came out when I was seven years old. While yes, the seventeen years since then have been a long time, a lot of the memories I have from those years do not seem so long ago. When I thought about what I wanted to write for my second submission to the PPMA newsletter, I figured I would give a sort-of sequel to my first submission. Almost a year ago to this point I was writing about enjoying my last summer ever, and how fast the first year of podiatric medical school flew by. And even though I said and expected it, my second year came and went even faster.

The progression through my education has certainly been bittersweet. On one hand, I have had the opportunity to continue to learn, to grow, and to form memories that I’ll never forget. Moments like our class White Coat Ceremony were not even on my radar at this time last year. Being able to celebrate the culmination of the last few years of hard work with my classmates and family is something that I will never forget. On the other hand, the same progression through my education can be unforgiving, and will keep marching even if I’m not ready for it to. Last year, I wrote about how I wanted to use the summer to return to some of my hobbies. That summer that seemed, in the moment, to last forever is now just a memory. As I did before that summer, I now spend much of my days studying, whether it be for my next exam in school, or for the first part of my board exams. While they were certainly on my mind back then, it just doesn’t feel real that we’re less than two months from test day. Preparing has been a stressful and time consuming process, but one that I know is worth it.

Although it can be unrelenting, I appreciate that my perception of time is malleable. I think there is no better description of the outlook I’ve taken on the last few years of my life and education than the phrase “the days are long but the years are short”. I have many more long days to go before I graduate, but after I cross that stage, I’ll probably do some introspection and realize just how quickly it all went by. To take a page out of Taylor Swift’s playbook, I’ll just enter a new era, and get to reminisce about the ones that came before it.