Saturday, March 13, 2010

Home sweet home

My bags are not packed (yet) but I'm certainly ready to go. Guess what I'm NOT taking with me? The Thesis. I'm leaving it behind in Glasgow and I plan to enjoy several weeks of thesis-free relaxation.

A reward I bought for myself for finishing the thesis (it was a great motivator to finish!) was a lens for my camera so I'm looking forward to playing around with it. I'm looking forward to seeing my friends and family, and I think they're as excited about it as I am. The one sad notable exception is someone I used to be pretty close to; let's call him R. R's reaction when I informed him of my imminent arrival in SL was lukewarm to say the least, and when specifically asked "Do you think we will meet up?" was a lackluster half-arsed "I suppose so". Disappointing to say the least, as I had always considered R one of my closest friends, but it's a pattern to his behaviour I have noticed in the past few years; it seems that he only makes an effort to be my friend and keep in touch/meet up with me when he is single. Since he's currently in a relationship with someone, I guess that's me out of the picture. Needless to say it makes me feel like a piece of meat but I think it reflects worse on him for seemingly having ulterior motives to being friends with me. I'd by lying if I said it doesn't bother me, but honestly, I've worked too hard the past few months and been through too much the past year to let this ruin things for me now.

A small part of me (okay a big part) is slightly apprehensive about going home. The past couple of months have been intensely difficult and my mindset has been focused entirely on 'finish thesis, submit, get a flight back home'. I haven't had time to think about the 'being home' part of it. It's been just over a year now since the last time I went home, and this time will be infinitely different to all the previous times I've been home. There will be so many memories to deal with like seeing my dad's clothes, seeing the stuff we bought together, seeing his handwriting on random stuff...stuff I can easily block out when I'm in Glasgow. There will be so many things that I can no longer do with my dad like late Sunday afternoon rides in the car with the top down, trips to Yala and Udawalawe...I don't think I've really thought about that side of it, nor prepared myself for it, so I'm hoping that part won't suck too badly.

So yeah, mixed feelings about getting on a plane on Monday, but overall I think it should be a good break!

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Panic

Is it normal to have post-submission panic? I wouldn't know because I've never submitted a PhD thesis before. I totally wasn't expecting this. One moment I'm calm and happy and serene and the next I'm imagining all sorts of typos and frantically flipping through the thesis hoping I won't find them.

I had a horrible nightmare too, I dreamt that I was at the viva and I was doing horrendously, and the examiners felt sorry for me and started telling me how I should respond to being grilled - for next time, because I failed the viva and I had to re-submit and re-do the viva. Fuck.

Then I woke up and felt relieved for a second that it was a dream and then panicky again that it might end up being true.

Fell back asleep and dreamt that all my teeth fell out and I couldn't find dentures in time for the viva. I'm not kidding about that, that was my actual dream.

I really am my own worst enemy sometimes.

Monday, March 08, 2010

The End

The thesis. Is over. I'm going to get the beast bound today and then I will submit it. The past 3+ years of my life represented by 210 pages is a scary thought. My viva has been scheduled for May 6th. I will worry about that closer to the date, but for now I'm just enjoying this delicious feeling of a well-deserved sense of accomplishment from writing it all up. I can't wait to have my life back!

Also, this blog is back on public view now. Sorry for the inconvenience over the past few months. Thanks for hanging around!