So, now you get to hear from the part of me that is moving on.
Good news. A small milestone has been reached. My concept paper, thrashed into submission, has apparently received thumbs up from my faceless nameless dissertation committee. My dissertation chairperson emailed me today to say she has sent my concept paper to the Graduate School reviewers. This is not a formality. This is serious. They have the power to kick me out of the program, send me home empty-handed, no consolation prize after seven years and $45,000. I can't worry about any of that. I hope it is approved, because I'm embarrassed to admit, I'm really sick of this leg of this endless journey.
Although the next leg of the journey is the dissertation proposal, just more torture at a deeper level. The concept paper was toothpicks under the fingernails. Now it will be the rack and hot branding irons. I know what you are thinking. How can I complain about such a luxury problem? I'm alive, after all. No argument. But whining is what I do. I'm chronically malcontented.
Speaking of malcontentedness, today I made the trek to Wilsonville in an early morning rainstorm. December, ho hum. I arrived on time as the sky was lightening in the east. I dutifully arranged the tables and wrote the chapter notes on the whiteboard. Then I waited for my four students. One showed up. Gina (not her real name) and I had a nice discussion for two hours, but I worry about the missing students. It's only the second week of school.
When students are absent, I always give them the benefit of the doubt. I don't automatically assume they were too tired from partying the night before to get out of their cozy warm beds. They could be sick. Their child could be sick. They could be snowed in—some places in the hinterburbs got snow last night. Hell, I don't know. They didn't call in to the school as they are required to do. They could be lying dead by the side of the freeway. Ugh, cancel that thought. I'd feel pretty bad if I complained about their attendance when come to find out they are dead.
I don't know, should I even joke about people being dead? It doesn't seem all that funny anymore, does it. It's only funny if it isn't happening. Or if you don't really think about the reality of death. Once it happens, once you really think about it, death casts a dismal pall over everything. Death isn't all that funny. People die all the time. But you don't expect it to be a bunch of little kids. Maybe in Syria, but not in America. Although why I assume we should be exempt is a fallacy worth examining in some future blog post.
This week I feel like I'm moving through a dark fog. My emotions have flatlined. Even my relief at hearing the hopeful news about my concept paper hardly registers on the emotions scale. The best I can muster right now is a heavy sigh.
