I have very distinct memories of the experience of sitting down to write my Master’s thesis. They are vaguely painful memories involving me not leaving my 10′ x 15′ studio apartment for long periods of time while I sat at my desk. Over the course of weeks I sat “reviewing notes and research” which, as it happens, was actually quite useful, but still was just a disguise. I had absolutely no idea how to begin.
Finally it got to the point where it was do or die — a full draft was due to my advisor in mid-February and if I didn’t make the deadline I’d potentially jeopardize my ability to graduate in May. Some time in mid-January I said to myself, “This is it. I will write something today if it kills me.” It took me a full day of staring at the blank MS Word screen to eke out a single paragraph, but I did it.
Part of my motivation — honestly, the only reason that paragraph got written — was that I was supposed to go see a friend play that night at a club and I wouldn’t allow myself out unless progress had been made. The crap had gone on for long enough, and it was time to get a move on. That night there was a snowstorm and very few people made it out to see him play, but I was there. And I spent half the night jumping uncontrollably around the practically empty hall as I burned off the pent-up energy that had been building all day. Then, before I knew it, I had the 95-page thesis draft out the door, on time and everything.
I have spent the last REDACTED NUMBER of weeks and months writing proposals about my dissertation — for approval, for funding, all sorts of things. Generally, I’ve got the cocktail conversation down pat and I can describe the project in different levels of detail, but the thing is that I haven’t actually written anything. Not a word of actual, bona fide dissertation text.
Things are a little different now than they were when I was writing the thesis; for one thing, I’m not confined to a single room anymore. Also, there’s no real deadline [yet]. And I know that it just isn’t possible to write a dissertation that quickly.
And oh my god this is hard.
But this is what I signed up for. This is the rewarding part — this is the part that’s mine – this is when I get to filter through all the books I’ve read and films I’ve seen and people I’ve talked to and write something that no one else has ever written before. And I’m back at the bottom of a massive hill, blank page and all. In the last two days, I’ve written an entire paragraph (all of which was written about an hour ago). I do have a certain amount of faith that once I get things set up, some skeletal form will start to take shape, but until then, I’ve been spending far too much time checking up on facebook.
Tomorrow.
Tomorrow will bring clarity. And focus. And words. Lots and lots of words.



