Well, I've just finished making the final edits on my thesis. It doesn't seem like it can actually be done. I have all the signatures I need and I'm 33 pages of acid free paper away from officially turning it in. While this project has been the bane of my existence for the past 3 months, it feels like I may have actually accomplished something. It felt very collegial to get an email from my second reader congratulating me on a job well done, and making suggestions about revising it for publication. Wow.

Next week, I have to present it to the faculty. I get 15 minutes to distill 33 pages and 6 months of work into something intelligible and interesting. I'm really anxious about it, but at the same time, excited. It's like a bar mitzvah - or a debutante ball. My coming out party, if you will.

I probably don't ever want to do a statistical analysis project again, but it feels like an important obstacle for me to have overcome.

I also feel that I've learned a lot about my ability to survive and to balance life. After my first draft was handed in, my chair shot back at me with some major data analysis revisions, and I cried, and I screamed, and I freaked out on Joshua. But, I managed to work it all in, and re-write the entire second half of my paper, even as I grieved the loss of my dear Grammy. Last weekend was a whirlwind of visiting family, crying, mourning, and absorbing how life can change in a moments time. And, in all of it, I didn't crack up. I lived.

After next week, I think I'll have crossed another big hurdle in my life - self-revelation. In sharing with the faculty my work, I'll be sharing part of myself - my interests, my convictions, my theoretical leanings. I don't like it when people know things about me. And I especially don't like public scrutiny. I think after next week, I'll feel more like a scholar and less like a student. Here's hoping.