Itazurana Kiss

When I started medical school, it was the first time living more than a mile from Alan. This was in the days before everyone was on facebook, so it was hard for me. He gave me a paper cutout of Kirby he had made, and I had a few other things to remember him by. We would talk occasionally (mostly on land lines -- we shared one cell phone.), and would chat on instant messenger.

Every summer, we would try to go as many times as possible to Six Flags Great America. He would come down for long weekends, and I would come up. He met my med school friends, and we would even share CDs of episodes that he or Linda had burned of anime episodes.

If you're not familiar with J-pop and K-pop, you're not missing out too much. But all these shows had  starting and ending credits with songs, oftentimes with broken English lyrics, or with silliness that totally didn't match the content of the show.

"Oh no! Kikyo just fell off a cliff into a raging river!"

[translation: playful/mischievous kiss]

When I started med school, Alan and Linda were the same height (four eleven and three quarters?). He was a little kid. When I graduated, he was still the shortest person in the family, but he had started to shoot up. The first hints of the darkness had set in, but really hadn't established themselves firmly yet. By the time I had reached residency, things were clearly different. We couldn't go to Great America because he couldn't get his sleep schedule straight. He had migraines all the time. He was missing school for them. He never really seemed excited to go.

I would never have guessed that his slide would just keep going down, deeper and deeper into this dysphoric pit. Cue the silly pop music.