When people have had a near-death experience, many of them talk about seeing a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. No, I’m not near death, but after this weekend’s frenzy of getting my grad school portfolio together, I may be close.
I have gone through my entire program keeping careful track of all of my assignments, reflections, and the major aspects of my action research project. Everything is subdivided into organized folders on my computer. Organizing and collating this portfolio should’ve been a breeze, right? Not so much, unfortunately.
You see, for as neat and organized as I am with the electronic files on my computer, I am a mess at keeping all of the hard copies of my evidence, essays, reflections, and student samples in some sort of order. To be honest, I knew I had everything, the problem was: where? Looking back, I wish I had just dumped everything into a box in my room that I could sort through quickly. If only I had thought ahead.
As it was, I had papers in all sorts of places — in my binders, in my school bags, in my desk at school, and even in a box in the basement of my house. Ugh. Every time I looked for something that I needed I almost gave up hope, but then, miraculously, it would turn up.
Yesterday I spent a majority of the day organizing, compiling, collating, and writing. I worked from 11am-2pm. Then I went to CBCB’s house for a couple of hours to see her vacation photos from Greece (lucky bum). I came home and worked some more, but finally hit a wall at 6pm and decided to veg out in front of the t.v. for a little while. I think I fell asleep somewhere around 8:30pm and didn’t wake up until 10:30pm, when the phone rang. One of my grad school buddies was calling to check on how something was supposed to be organized. Good thing! The call was exactly what I needed to get my second wind. I worked from 11pm-5am. Yes, 5 am in the morning! Into the wee hours of the night. I finally went to sleep this morning at 5am and woke up at 10am. Then it was back to work, from 11-noon. A quick stop to my parents’ house to pick up a hole punch turned into two hours of me driving all the way to school to get my more industrial strength hole punch from my classroom. I got back home at 2:30 and was raring to go. I was printing fiend…until I ran out of paper.
HOW COULD I RUN OUT OF PAPER AT A TIME LIKE THIS? Didn’t I get that ream of paper I had at school? Where is it, it’s got to be here somewhere. Nope, I left it at school. Aaaaaaaaahhhhhh!!!!
Stressed out and panicked, I called BFF to see if she had any paper I could borrow. She had just returned from a women’s wellness weekend, and was as relaxed and calm as I was stressed and out of my mind. I was talking a mile a minute, and she was answering back in a slow, lilting voice. Talking to her actually showed me how tightly wound I was all weekend.
Paper in hand, I started back to work. Printing, stapling, and hole-punching. Getting everything in just the right spot in the binder.
And finally, I had done everything except finish my leadership growth essay. Nothing more to focus on as a way of procrastination. The majority of the paper had been written in February, so all I really had to do was edit a few things, add in some evidence, and write the conclusion. Which I did. I wrote a metaphor about a path, a journey, and how no one wants to follow a leader who doesn’t know where she’s going. It is actually very good, although after reading it, I wasn’t completely satisfied. I think that at this point I am way too close to it, not to mention a bit sleep deprived. I’ll look at it again later tonight and see I can perfect it any further.
But that’s not the point. The point is that I can see a small light at the end of the tunnel. May 12 is nearing closer, and soon I will be DONE. For now I’m done (lower case, since there’s still another paper to turn in next week), and I couldn’t be happier. It wasn’t easy, but this huge portion of my grad school coursework is now totally and completely and wonderfully done!!!!
Even though you had some moments of panic this weekend, be proud! You are just about there! Completing grad school is something that I have put off & put off. Mainly because others thought the degree should be in my current field & I know this is not the field I belong in. I plan to start in January on a second bachelor’s degree. Okay, a little off track there! I applaud you for sticking to it and accomplishing this goal! Hurrah!
Good for you! I have a presentation binder that i need to work on this week and I’m putting it off. I also have my expenses from january to current to do. it’s rainy, I should do it all today.