.: p.s :.: Polly

It's Match Day for Santino's residency program (the day to find out our "destiny" for our next 5 years.) We got Eli ready, even topped with a nice bath early that morning and he was really cooperative with no hassle to get out of the door and arrived at the Cultural Activity Center by 9:45 am without stressing Santino out. At 10 am, the whole class was ready to get a group picture taken before they would find out where each one will be going.

While Santino was doing that, Eli was fast asleep in the carseat I had nothing to do, so I went and mingled with my two co-workers/friends Leila and Bobbie Ann who took part in organizing this Match Day event (I worked at the medical school also).

Finally got our first picture together with Leila.

And finally not in my "designer gown" (last picture of us was before having Eli in the delivery room) with Bobbie Ann.

Because the Match Day is a national event, all 4th year medical students nationwide opened their "envelopes" at the same time. There were still time to kill after their group picture (so annoying to have to wait!) a few of Santino school buddies got together for a picture... (left to right: Puya, Glenn, David, Eric, Santino, Adeel, Jeremy and Adrian) After 4 years of hard work, and the moment of truth was about to enfold. Another great news of the moment was Glenn's wife Claudia had just delivered her beautiful baby Hanna a few hours ago prior to that... what a day!

About 5 minutes before the ceremony, some of my co-workers discovered Eli in the carseat and couldn't resist his charm, and the result? Eli greeted them with a loud fussy cry. (I managed to stay with Santino until he picked up his envelope.)

Finally at 11 am, everyone was situating themselves in the conference room. You can definitely feel the craziness in this little area which filled with the classmates and their close families and friends. Then they started calling the student's names one by one to pick up their envelopes (which also felt like eternity!).

And here's Santino's turn...

Santino with his result in this yellow envelope... can't wait.

one of my co-worker was so kindly to take care and feed him while we were busy with the ceremony, but after Santino's turn, I could still hear my child's cry from afar (which also applied to the rest of the people there) so I went and picked him up. I took him as far as possible and tried to calm him down, I guess he sensed the "excitement" too, and he just seemed to cried louder than ever. I took him outside and forgot about the time. Finally I turned around and saw through the glass door from the conference room... everybody was hugging each other and I knew I was missing this important moment! They already opened their envelopes! I ran with Eli in my arms as fast as I could... it wasn't easy to get back to Santino, I had to push around everyone who were in my way.

I finally got to Santino. I nervously asked where we were going, and he still made me guess (I felt like strangling him at the moment). My gut feeling that morning was Arizona. Finally Santino told me I got that right. My tears came down my cheeks, and Santino was choking up as well. We smiled also and hugged each other. It was an emotional and humbling experience.

My mind flashed back with our life of the past 4 years going through medical school, I was so happy and glad for Santino, we have been waiting this moment to find out since forever ago. The Mayo Clinic in Arizona was his first choice. I had no doubt of Santino's talent and ability, but it was hard to estimate our chance as the same time. We could only rely on our faith that the Lord has the best in store for us no matter where we go. We felt so blessed and lucky that we matched at the Mayo Clinic.

So, March 19th was also our anniversary. We now have been married for 4 sweet years. The match was already a really great anniversary gift to us. Besides some sentimental gifts we got for each other, we also went on a cruise with the class that was organized by the school for Match Day to the Flagship Texas.

Happy Match Day!

The girls: Paige, Kassie, Aubrey, me & Amanda.

The boys: Ty, Jeremy, Santino, Eric & David.

Group picture. (And I noticed something was wrong with the height thing there...)

Some of my favorite classmates of Santino's: Tasha & Keisha.

beautiful Sally,

And sweet Tiffany.

The cruise was actually not that exciting, but it does sound so exotic to tell people that we went on a cruise on our 4th year anniversary.

Eli also turned 6 weeks old. We left him for the first time (farther then the distance of the bedroom to the bathroom) with our friends who agreed to babysit. I experienced a separation anxiety that night. He was so cute/wide awake/and talking the moment we were leaving. My eyes were wet and I just couldn't stand it. In my mind there were so many "What if?" I couldn't get him off my mind the whole evening. I called our friends during the cruise and for some reason they later told me they didn't have our cell number to call back so I never heard back from them... and that was hard. We didn't get back to pick him up around midnight and lucky to find that our little guy did so well! (It is always a good sign when your babysitter agree to do it again.) They loved and enjoyed him and was really sweet to them! We were so proud of little Eli!

What a day! Arizona, here we come! Happy 4th year anniversary, and I am so proud of you, my love!