After that Short Break

I'm back. I don't know for how long, but after a year I think that it would be helpful to start blogging again. Why? You may ask. Well, a couple of reasons. Most importantly, I've moved into a new stage in this dissertation process and that new stage creates both new needs and new anxieties. I'm officially ABD now and have my dissertation proposal approved (or at least it will be when I finish my minor revisions). No more classes, no more grades, no more due dates. Just me and my subjects. For the next several YEARS.

On a lot of levels, of course, this is really exciting. I'm interested in my project. I think it's got the potential to make a difference (a tenured commentator talked about potential to make a splash). And the research should be pretty painless. On the other hand, it turns out the the gradunoia (PhD program induced lack of confidence in your own ability) doesn't got away with the imaginary ABD certificate. And my hope is writing here will help me express some of that. It also turns out that to go a good job with this project, I need to do a lot of thinking - about how I want to approach it, about how I want to organize it, about how I want to organize approaching it. There's just a lot to think about, and somehow writing about it to you, gentle readers, feels like it will make it all clear.

So, after that short break, I'm back. And we'll see how it goes.