Brace Yourselves...

My thesis defense date has been set for the 26th of April, and I couldn't be happier to finally be at the endgame. Well, I suppose I could be happier, but I'm happy enough. Extreme emotions can only be sustained for short periods of time, else one develops an electro-chemical imbalance that can lead to severe complications. So, yeah, I'm content.

I don't really have much to add right now, mostly because I just don't feel like writing about anything else. We've been here for so long and we've missed out on so much at home, but it's finally about to pay off big time. Once I have my master's degree and my thesis finalized, I can finally stake some more permanent claim in my field; I'll have an artifact. That artifact tells a story, an important story for me now and, just maybe, an important story for others some day in the future. It also gives me a resource from which to pull when I do further work, possibly even article and book publications, but most importantly it's a token, a trinket I leave behind.

Now, I don't know what story is going to be told, or if anyone is even going to pick it up. Truth be told, if my work is remembered at all, I'll probably be written-off as a mere dissenter who contributed little of substance to his area, let alone the field or world at large. That's okay. What's important is that I know it's out there and that it's out there at all. As much as I seek an audience with other minds for the sake of debate and collaboration, at the end of the day I really have to fall back on my own sense of judgement and self-satisfaction. I have to examine whether I lived up to my own standards and, if I did, then I need to be content with that. After all, you can't please everybody, and you'll likely never please those with whom you disagree.

That all being said, I'm going to wrap this up now. I was up late last night helping a friend with an important project. Yeah, being close to completion means I have time to do that now, and I like to help people. That's why I got into this lifestyle to begin with, and it's important to think about that every so often. That's my challenge for all of my readers today: Think about why you do what you do, what your reasons for going into your profession were and what they are now. Just have a nice long think and see where it takes you.

Me? I'm gonna' catch some elusive Z's.

Passing out now,

Colin