And then everyone clapped
The setting is Christmas from last year. I was celebrating it for the first time in France. A friend of mine had invited me to his place in the hinterlands of the southern French countryside. Incidentally, I happen to be celebrating Christmas this year with him and his family again—I am headed to his place as I write this.
Picture this: I'm there, surrounded by the ambience of a classic southern French Christmas—the scent of pine, and a table overflowing with festive delights—all perfectly ordinary, until the conversation turned towards my yet-to-begin internship, which, in their minds, was already a full-blown PhD (in hindsight, they were right because a year later, that is exactly what I am doing right now).
"So, what's your internship about?" my friend's mother asked, her eyes full of genuine curiosity.
I took a breath, ready to dive into the technical intricacies of developing algorithms for tracking intra-cellular particles.
As I explained the complex nuances of my research, I watched the room's expressions change from attentive curiosity to a sudden spark of awe. Then came the moment that launched a thousand laughs—my friend's sister, with a wide-eyed expression, exclaimed, "Wow, you'll be a doctor!"
“Chapeau!”, she congratulated me.
And just like a perfectly orchestrated symphony, she started clapping. Her applause was contagious. In a blink, the entire room joined in—the friend, the mother, the grandfather, the sister, the child, the sister’s husband—everyone was clapping as if conferring an honorary doctorate upon me. I am sure at one point, some didn’t know why they were clapping, but they didn’t want to be left out.
I couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity of it all. Here I was, yet to step foot into my internship, and I had unwittingly ascended to the esteemed rank of a future doctor in the eyes of this merry Christmas gathering.
This was my “then everyone clapped” moment into doctor-dom, and I didn’t even have to do anything for it. But hey, sometimes you don’t need reality checks anyway.