A Thesis

It is supposed to be the cumulation of knowledge that I have gained in my 'field'. It is supposed to be tidy, concise, sophisticated, and unique. I am not sure that mine will be any of those things (though tidy sounds fitting considering I am still finding the 35-45 page minimum a bit daunting). It does not matter here, but I am writing my thesis on Isaiah Berlin's Two Concepts of Liberty. I am supposed to be done by now, with the entire thing, but I have yet to send my professor a first draft. This says much about this last year and my feelings about philosophy at this point. Philosophy feels narrow, a tight squeeze in a big world that requires a wide lens. I feel unsuited for the work sitting in front of me. It requires a kind of focus I find difficult to muster right now. What I want to think about right now is what education is and what it means in our world, I want to write 40 pages about what I have learned as a human being, as an American, as a woman, as a daughter and a wife and a sister- as I finish my B.A. and its 4-college, 6-year journey. I want to write about all that I have really learned: about the creation of life and what that means, how to be a more loving person and give myself 100% to all that I do, how to go through every day and look at the chaos in our world with a little less trepidation, and the understanding that the path I choose does matter to the world.

Those all sound like philosophical questions and realizations don't they? And yet the world of academic philosophy could care less about what any individual philosopher actually thinks, questions, or feels in her own personal life. Academic philosophy is a weird world and one that I am both excited by and also repulsed by. So here I sit, with my wide assortment of study goodys, trying to feel ready to tackle this project, to get as much done in one day as is humanly possible, so that my professor might be fooled in to thinking I have put long hours over the last three months into this. It is not likely he will be fooled. I just hope he spares me the humility of pointing out this obvious truth: I should not have been a philosophy major. No, this is not self-abasement with the hope that anyone will pity me. I love philosophy, I can read it, I can talk it, I can think it, but the particular exactitude required in writing it is not something that comes naturally and is not something I ever wish to perfect. I prefer writing that allows for my personal dramatics and touch of the comic- I am a writer of fiction touched by reality or maybe reality touched by fiction? I know that now, I wish I had known it before, but I am learning that as much of getting your B.A. is about learning what you love, it is also learning about what you don't love. It is also the realization that loving something is not always enough; or maybe it is enough but it certainly is not the same thing as desiring to do it day in an day out for any sustained period of time.

And now that this clever diversion tactic has worn its welcome, I will sign off and actually get to work.