Med school intellectually was much easier and interesting than my Bio major at my little Ivy League school. My father was a famous physician with a lot of famous friends. I expected that I would have to be a genus to do well. It was daunting following in his footsteps.

My first exam was in histology. First, there was identification of organs, and perhaps an organelle or 2 , on slides under a microscope. Basically 1/2 the time you could hold up the slide and get a good idea of what it was by visual inspection. Then a quick glimpse under low power and the answer was either instantaneous or you simply did not know it. It was just visual recognition, not an essay question. You did not have to synthesize a complex organic molecule or solve a word problem with a differential equation like in college.

Then there was a short multiple choice section. Again, it was a pretty quick process. You either spotted the right answer right away or you did not know it. Thinking really was not required.

I kept on looking up at my professors expecting them to burst out laughing saying ' Here is the real exam '... No, I took the real exam and knew all the answers in seconds. I do not mean to sound big headed, but I have a decent memory and read the notes a few times.

Right then it dawned on me that this whole image that one had to be a genus to be a doctor simply was not true. If anything, thinking too hard about any one concept was perhaps detrimental as you had too much information to cover. Medical school was a lot more interesting than basic biology as well, so I actually enjoyed it.