Let's Cuddle

When asked what my thesis is about, I tend to stumble over myself.

My grandma. Well...
Me? Um..

My family? Sorta..
Jerk men? Ah...
Love? Bleh...
Heartbreak? Eh...

Well, no. Wait, it is about me, but it's also about all that other stuff too. Then I try to compile it all together and make sense of it. Clearly, this is a very important question that I need to be able to answer come defense time. So now that it's basically all put together, I've really been going over in my head how I would describe my thesis.

I think the title tells it best: Junction. This book is about junctions. The places and people coming together or splitting off in different directions. What do you choose? Who do you choose? Which direction do you go? And why? I use other people to tell my story, and none of those stories are completely true, but they're just true enough. They all play off of each other. They all come together. They all tell you about me.

Today, I finished formatting my thesis, and I was overwhelmed by a huge sense of accomplishment. I printed it out just to feel how thick it was, just to look at it on paper. I still have one more phone conversation with Blas tomorrow, but I'm at the homestretch. It is sad. Very sad, but so cool too. I had to cite my own poems in my Works Cited page, and that was oddly cool. Yeah, they're just being cited as being in my thesis, but they're cited somewhere. They will soon officially exist. Well, sort of?

Anyway, wow. Is it already, really, pretty much over? My thesis has a name. My future book has a name. Yikes.

I'm feeling a smidge slap happy, so today, triggered by a conversation with a friend, I started coming up with the soundtrack to my thesis. Dorky, I know. But it's in my head now. I was telling her about a quote that I want to use to preface my poems in the manuscript, and she was telling me that it would probably get shot down, so I tried to explain to her why I thought it belonged there. She then replied, "Love is a battlefield." Which immediately brought to mind the song. And I'm like yeah, that's totally the core of my thesis.

So, in no particular order, welcome to the soundtrack of my manuscript:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah, I threw some Creed in there, so sue me. So, I guess by now you should have figured out that my thesis is largely about relationships. Mostly romantic ones, but also between family members. Most of them are about heartbreak. I think I only have like one optimistic one. Have you ever tried to write a happy love poem? It's hard. It's very hard. And unrealistic. Relationships aren't perfect.

 

Basically, my thesis is about how much love sucks, but you can't help but feel it, and it tears you apart, builds you up, breaks you down, makes you crazy, thrills you, lets you down, leaves you breathless, makes you want to puke, is sometimes volatile, is the best thing, is the worst thing, etc...

 

Anyway, next time I post will probably be after I've stuck three copies of my thesis in the mail. Fingers crossed from here on out!