I just got to the top of the little hill. Yes, I'm pleased to say that I submitted the second draft of my concept paper to my chairperson today. I'm sure she'll have some edits, but for now, the thing is off my plate onto hers, and I hope she's hungry, because she's got 45 pages to read, not counting the annotated bibliography (which I bet nobody reads. I finally figured out the annotated bibliography is a drop-and-give-me-100 sort of exercise, designed to separate the whiners from the stoics. Stoics win.)
So what did I do after I got to the top of the hill? I felt strangely empty. I ran a couple errands in a haphazard, poorly planned fashion, and then I went home and took a nap. I wanted to keep sleeping. My head is full of June fog. Oh, wait. It's July now, isn't it. I guess I need to peel off June and see what barn or shed awaits me on the July page of whatever promotional calendar hangs on my wall. The weather was dull today, to match my brain fog and my mood. You'd think I would be elated, wouldn't you. Well, you would be wrong. For one thing, I'm a chronic malcontent. Elated is not in my lexicon of feelings. For another thing, look at my calendar. There are some massive mountains I must climb. This little hill was a gentle slope compared to what I fear is coming next.
I'm feeling anxious that this dissertation process is taking so long. I essentially re-wrote the entire paper (except for the annotated bibliography), so it was a fairly large undertaking. But there were many distractions along the way: work, cat, Mom... If I worked on the paper 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, it probably would have taken about two weeks. Maybe less. It took me two months of Fridays and half days on Saturday and Sunday. What's that, like twelve days? Yeah, that sounds about right.
I am so tired I can't think. I will finish this when I have some functioning brain cells.
