Loose Ends & Moving On

As I finish up this chapter (today) I am faced with the fact that this is my last 'academic' project until I get news about my PhD. Perhaps that is a little dramatic since I do have a paper for AoIR to research and co-write and that research methods project my colleague and I keep talking about doing, but I really feel like once this is submitted, I will have an empty road for the next few months. I am sure that my children will be happy to hear it though. And my parents too, since I have often been "too busy" to chat when they would call to check in.

Finishing my MA was a great milestone to hit, but now I am faced with tying up loose ends. Some of those ends are professional (I loved saying hello to all of my old professors when I was on campus; chatting with the secretaries in the department..) and, I fear, some of them are personal. Over the last 2 years friends and classmates have splintered in different directions as everyone moves on to pursue their studies somewhere else. Some have already left and some are leaving soon, but contact in both cases have been dwindling, and eventually, I will just have to let them go - some will be harder than others, but at this point, all I can do is move on and hope our paths cross again sometime in the future.

Maybe in letting go, I will be able to move forward.