Nearly Finished

Something big happened today.

That ‘little paper’ I’ve been working on for the last three years… I officially submitted it to Registry. It was 226 pages long (1.5 spaced!). Just think… 226 pages on 1/3 of a verse! And there was so much more that could have been written.

So what does ‘submission’ mean? Am I done yet? Well, not quite. ‘Submission’ means that I can no longer make any changes to the dissertation before my viva, the oral exam, which I’m anticipating will occur sometime in March. It means that the dissertation I submitted today will be sent to my two examiners, one here in St Andrews and the other who lives in Edinburgh. They have 6+ weeks to read it before they conduct my viva. I’m still waiting to hear about an exam date.

Until then, there is much to be done, beginning with taking a short holiday! I’m heading down to England for a quick trip this weekend, and next week will head West to Dublin! My cousin and his family moved there this autumn, so now’s my chance to visit them. When January is over, so will be my break. I’ll spend February preparing for the viva, which will primarily entail re-reading what my examiners have written and re-learning what I wrote in the dissertation. Shouldn’t I know it all already? I did write it, after all. Probably. But there are thousands of unimaginable details, people, and I need to be prepared to talk about and defend them all.

So now I wait for the viva. Waiting seems to be the game I’m forced to play these days. Hopefully I’ll have updates in the next week or so on anything that might come after the viva. Hoping and waiting, and waiting and hoping. I’m learning that I’m not nearly as patient as I think I am. One of the many lessons of life we’re forced to learn.