grab hold

The days are flying by and I am trying to grab hold of pieces of them as they whip past me.

I have finished a conference paper, a conference proposal, and a fellowship application in the past 48 hours. In the next week, I will finish another conference paper, a final paper draft, a course assignment, and I will grade 90 papers. Then I'll have about 4-5 weeks to turn the final paper draft into a final paper proper, read and take notes on 1000 pages of philosophy of education reading, read and make annotations of 40-50 religion and education sources, finish 2 long-overdue papers, grade 90 more papers, and complete a final course assignment (in lieu of a final exam). I think this is manageable. It'll mean a lot of work, of course, but let's be honest: I've done this to myself. I just need to hold steady till mid-December. And there's plenty of fun to be had during this time, too. Let's not forget that.

I can't tell you how excited I am about the next year and a half. I am so ready to work on my dissertation, and I am so ready to start looking for jobs. One of my friends told me tonight that he thought it'd been a weird semester for me, a sort of transition; and he's right. I feel like I grew up a lot (became more of an "adult") this semester, largely because I've finally been honest with myself about what I want my life to be about. About what is likely to fulfill me. It's scary, because it's a different path than what I had always envisioned for myself, but I think it's liberating, in that the vision I used to have was not emerging from within. What I envision for myself now feels right.