Foot on the Floor

My friends who've already passed the comprehensive exam generally tell me that their productivity came and went in waves.  After a particularly productive week, they'd find themselves letting off the gas a little bit, and then they'd get back to serious work a few days later.  I can see how this is a productive approach and how, to continue with the analogy, it would keep you from running out of gas.  Unfortunately, I do not have this luxury.  When you have a small child, all kinds of things come up that are out of your control to throw a wrench in your plans.  Like Friday, when she had a fever and I had to stay home with her.  Or today and yesterday, when her school was closed due to Hurricane Sandy.  It's tempting to think, "You know what? I'm ahead of my reading schedule this week, I'm going to take a night off and hang out with Billy."  But I feel like I have to keep my foot on the floor whenever I'm traveling the open road because I never know when I'll come up on another roadblock.

That said, my reading is going well.  Here's my list:

As you might guess, I've finished all the texts that are crossed out.  Today I reached a major milestone: none of the novels left on my list are over 300 pages long.  This means that everything left could feasibly be completed in a single day.  My apprehension about completing the list is decreasing while my apprehension about being able to consolidate my thoughts into the presentation with which I will begin the exam is increasing.  So it goes.

I must get back to work, but in case I haven't said this emphatically enough before, I want to say it now: this thing that I'm doing, which is really hard, is also a really, really exceptional privilege.  I can feel myself getting smarter every day.  Periodically I get to read articles that I read early in grad school over again, and it helps me to realize how far I've come intellectually in just a few years.  Having all of these ideas in my head concurrently is an unbelievable feeling that I assume could only be achieved by reading them all practically at once.  Basically, what I have gotten the chance to do is put together a list of the texts I think are most important, for the topic of a field and dissertation of my choosing, and then I have gotten to sit down and read all of these texts.  The minutes in my day that I don't spend with my daughter and/or husband are occupied with reading, thinking, and talking about art.

If I walk out of that test in less than a month, and they tell me I didn't make it far enough in the journey to pass, I won't be sorry for one minute of the ride.  I will have done what I set out to do: the best job I could.  And I only have to keep my foot on the floor for four more weeks before I get there.