Lots of Goings Ons

I signed the paperwork for Thomas' speech therapy last Thursday. Pat, our services coordinator, said that they have a shortage of speech therapists right now so I thought it might take a while to actually get an appointment. But I got a call today. Thomas starts speech therapy next Monday. He'll go once a week until he can accurately imitate sounds, has a 100 word vocabulary and can use 2-3 word phrases.

I also scheduled by dissertation proposal defense. On Wednesday, May 6th at 2 pm I'll sit down with 10 of the professors in my department and probably cry. No, I'll just want to cry.

My proposal is a 25 page paper that identifies the problem my dissertation will address and outlines my solution to it. The proposal defense is a working session - at least that's how the faculty views it. Students traditionally think of it as an hour-long opportunity for your professors to point out the weaknesses in your arguments and generally undermine your confidence in your philosophical abilities. Since I already have very little confidence in my philosophical abilities, it shouldn't take even that long. Though I doubt they'll cut it short, no matter how much I might wish they would.

Clearly, I am not looking forward to it. However, if I get through it (without crying, hyperventilating, vomiting or rashly faking an epileptic seizure) and my proposal passes (lets not even consider the alternative), I'll get my master's degree and I'll finally be able to teach. More importantly, the last five years will have proven not to have been a complete waste of time. (It was touch and go there for a while on that score).