[voiceover] Have you ever had the starring role on a play? The solo in a recital? All eyes on you, waiting for you to do what they came to see. Feeling the incredible pressure to perform. There was a time when they used to call operating rooms an operating theater. It still feels like one. Scores of people get ready for the show. The sets are arranged, there are costumes, masks, props, everything has to be rehearsed, choreographed, all leading to the moment when the curtain goes up. You know what they say about Carnegie Hall, there's only one way to get there...
[Jackson, Alex, Cristina and April are in the gallery watching Derek and the others separate the conjoined twins when Meredith walks in carrying Zola.]
Bailey spent the last two hours telling me how crappy my life is, but look at this face. Oh, Zola, look. [points at Derek] There's your daddy. He's about to repair a myelomeningocele. [coos to Zola] Can you say myelomeningocele?
Oh, it was fine. Actually, no line at all. I was able to get my sandwich, find my daughter, see my husband, go watch the groundbreaking surgery that's going on right next door. And still get back in time to do my work.
[to Ben] I had a husband and a baby and I was a surgeon. I had it all. And then it all turned bad. So I got divorced. And then I got back on my feet. I found you. And then there was a shooting. So now I am finally back on my feet again and I have you again. I just don't want it to blow up.
[voiceover] If only life was just a dress rehearsal and we had time to do-overs. We'd be able to practice and practice every moment until we got it right. Unfortunately everyday of our lives is its own performace. It seems like even when we get the chance to rehearse, and prepare, and practice... We've still not quite ready for life's grand moments.
[voiceover] There's nothing else we can do for you. These are the last words a surgeon wants to tell a patient. Giving up doesn't come easy to us, so we do everything in our power not to. For surgeons "lost cause" just means..."try a little harder".
[to Meredith] You want to waste your talent playing with one little predictable organ for the rest of your life? Nah, I'd rather spend my days leaping from the liver to the pancreas to the stomach to the bowel, and any one could go wrong at anytime. There's nothing wrong with knowing one organ and knowing it well, just like there's nothing wrong with being fifth-chair viola in the back of the orchestra. But it's a hell of a lot more fun being the conductor.
Because of my mother. I know. Don't you mention her, too. That's all anyone ever says it's in my blood, it's my legacy. That's why I don't want to do it. I don't want to be like my mother.
Meredith, look at everything you did today this party for your daughter, what you did for me in that O.R. You don't have to ever worry about being anything like your mother. I knew her, and you're nothing like your mother. You have a gift. Don't waste it.
[voiceover] When do you throw in the towel? Admit that a lost cause it's sometimes just that? There comes a point when it all becomes too much. When we get too tired to fight anymore. So we give up. That's when the real work begins. To find hope where there seems to be absolutely none at all.
[voiceover] The baby you have is the baby you were destined to have. It was meant to be. That's what all the adoption people tell you. Anyway... I like to think it's true, but everything else in the world seems so completly random. What if one little thing I said or did could have made it all fall apart? What if I've choosen another life for myself? Or another person? We might have never found each other. What if I've been raised differently? What if my mother had never been sick? What if I've actually had a good father? What if...? What if...? What if...?
[voiceover] Your life is a gift. Accept it. No matter how screwed up or how painful it seems to be. Somethings are going to work out as if they were destined to happen... As if they were just meant to be.
[voiceover] There are times in our lives when love really does conquer all: exhaustion, sleep deprivation, anything. And then there are those times when it seems like love brings us nothing but pain.
