12 CHRISTINA MILES I Am not a Doctor I am not a doctor; I am a writer. I don't think I would switch. Why? Because, I call My sister, and we talk. She says, while driving home from medical school, "I smell like a cadaver." We talk more. I ask why. "Because we started dissecting today. We're working on the neck, and moving down from there." "Oh, of course." What else could I say? I call her two weeks later. "We are playing with the arms, practicing shots. I got Fred in the deltoid." She named her cadaver Fred. "How fun:' I say. At the end of the semester, Fred's torso has been pulled apart and pieced back together. "I think we'll need new bodies in January. Fred looks rather mangled." she says. But me? I tell her about my writing class: the stories I've written and ones I'm reading. "They say Ezra Pound spent ten hours a day editing poems." I edit mine, injecting iambs and analyzing meter. When it's done, every sentence has been changed. "I'm glad we're starting a new genre next semester:' I say. "I feel rather mangled, and I think I reek of syntax."
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