Foxglove Flower, Franconia, New Hampshire 2017

Iha Kaul

This flower is like some people. Plain and unassuming on the outside, but as soon as you look in you find a beautiful pattern that tells a story. I took this photo before starting medical school, but now after more than a year of learning the intricacies of human vulnerability, the flower has new meaning for me. In medicine we are presented with the superficial and are required to make meaning out of what seems to be mundane. Until this last year, I was relatively free from the burden of recognizing the potential of human suffering that is inherent with even the smallest physical symptom. However the capacity to see these things has better equipped me to try to find the little things that give people’s lives meaning and purpose. From an 88-year old woman singing in her hospital bed that the Beatles song “Let It Be” had inspired her to complete a MOLST form, to another woman expressing concern that her cat “Queenie” would make new friends if she didn’t get discharged soon, people have shown me that there is a wide array of living beyond what we see on the outside. People are surprising, unique, and even sometimes wonderful. How exciting to be part of profession where I can see more of these human shades. I will say there have been some downsides to starting medical school. The old me only took this picture because it was a beautiful foxglove flower: as an expert MS2 I am concerned that the flower may be presenting with signs of idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura.

Iha Kaul is a second-year medical student. She enjoys practicing photography, in particular she enjoys taking pictures of faces and places.