Well, this is just a quick short post to say that yesterday TJ (that's me, but all people with PhDs talk about themselves in the third person) successfully defended her dissertation and is now a Doctor of Philosophy in Rangeland Ecology and Watershed Management.
It was a long and exhausting day. All total, my defense was about three and a half hours. I gave a one-hour presentation, which was followed by two and a half hours of questioning by my committee. I don't really know what to say about it other than it is finally O-V-E-R. I think it takes a while for these things to really settle into the psyche. PJ came to my presentation and said it was well-done and that he heard many people afterwards giving compliments about the work I have produced over these long six and a half years (including my MS work). My adviser, Scott, afterward said that there was a never a discussion among the committee members regarding whether I would be granted the PhD, and that they were all more than pleased with both my dissertation and presentation. That doesn't mean they let me off easy. The questions they asked afterward were rigorous and they challenged me on many things. I have dissertation revisions from each committee member to work on during the coming months as part of the preparation of my manuscripts for publication, but it doesn't appear at first glance to be anything terribly difficult.
I was really nervous going into yesterday and PJ did his best to make me laugh throughout the day, which was a good thing. The hardest part of the whole day: when I got to my aknowledgements slide ... PJ said it would be the hardest and it was. When I got to that final slide, I cried because there really are a lot of people to acknowledge. No one stands up there alone on that fateful day, and when you're there at the end, it really hits you how many people have been there for you in one way or another. I wasn't even able to get it all out because every time I tried, I got more choked up. Even now, it is difficult to write because I start to feel overwhelmed with so many different emotions. It was a long road and along the way there were many challenges and adversities in both my personal and academic life, and many times when I questioned whether it was worth it. I am happy that I stuck it out and more than thankful that I had the love and support of so many people along the way.
Then the gates of his heart were flung open, and his joy flew far over the sea. And he closed his eyes and prayed in the silences of his soul.
But as he descended the hill, a sadness came upon him, and he thought in his heart: How shall I go in peace and without sorrow? Nay, not without a wound in the spirit shall I leave this city.
Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart from his pain and his aloneness without regret?
Too many fragments of the spirit have I scatterd in these streets, and too many are the children of my longing that walk naked among these hills, and I cannot withdraw from them without a burden and an ache.
It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear with my own hands.
Nor is it a thought I leave behind me, but a heart made sweet with hunger and with thirst.
-Khalil Gibran
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