At the risk of being irreverent, I truly wonder if this is what being a prisoner is like -- feeling like just doing what you want is a far-off dream, part of a different life, part of a far-distant future life.  I can remember my friend Caren telling me that is what she hated most about being in school -- the sense that no matter how much time she had, she could apply more to her studies.   There was always more to do.

I've often felt that way about my work, as well.  But with work, people are paying for a certain amount of time, and they have a pretty good idea what quality product they're buying in that amount of time. They don't expect perfection of me, and I don't expect perfection of myself.  With school, it's different.

It's not that I've devoted as much time to it as I would have liked. It's that no matter how much time I'd devoted, I'd know that if I'd spent more time, I could be better prepared.  I could have learned more.  Hell, I could be wondering if I'd pass with distinction, instead of wondering if I can even pass at all.  

And then there are the people who are asking me if I'm almost done.  Ha!  This -- this hell -- is just the end of the beginning.  I still have the middle -- research methods and two optional courses -- to get through.  And then it's the beginning of the end, with the defence of the research proposal.  Then comes the interminable ending -- writing the dissertation; revising the dissertation; defending the dissertation.  Done? I think not!

I was reminded today about the two "camps" on faculty. There are the "boys", as I call them.  (There may be great gender significance to all this, but I've not done a thorough enough analysis to note more than the "boys" are in one camp; the "girls" are in another.)  The male professors I've run into -- or some of them at least.  They're like soldiers: if I survived hazing, then it must have had meaning, and that meaning is that it built team spirit, it built character, it separated the men from the boys.  These are good things, therefore, everyone has to go through hazing to get these benefits.  Being a full-time, twenty-something doctoral student who has never known more than the one knew the night before the comps is a fond memory for them.  And it was a rite of passage.   And we'll feel the same way.  Really we will.

And then there are the "girls", who don't think that anyone really did this "full" time, unless they had a wife or mother taking responsibility for the rest of life matters.  They think the process is a fond memory for the boys, and a silly ritual that doesn't prove anything to anyone -- except it proves to the boys that what they went through really did have value, as they thought.

Should I ever be in a position to influence how the rite of passage is observed, I'll not defend this madness.  I'll not rewrite history to make this torture noble and valuable and meaningful.  It sucks, and no-one should have to do it.  Period.

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