Tuesday, March 27, 2007 | by nathan

Hey, Big Spender

When I was a senior in college, I wrote a rather long honors thesis for my religion major about sexual theology, and homosexuality in particular. As part of my research I conducted a semester-long Bible study on campus about these issues that, while not particularly successful, fed my thesis so perfectly that I felt as if most of the work had been done for me.

I could not have been more wrong, of course, and I realized this when it got to be April 13-ish and I realized I HADN’T WRITTEN A SINGLE DAMN WORD. Yes, I had researched, and made notes, and prepared for the study, etc. etc. But I had not written a single page of the 40+ pages I was expected to have for my thesis. This on top of having both papers AND finals in every class I was taking, which was a lot. It was the single most rigorous semester I had at Wake Forest - or, one of them, anyway - and here I hadn’t done a single damn thing to get the honors for which I had applied and which, because of the credits I still needed to graduate, was now required for me to receive a degree.

So, I wrote the thing. In four days. That’s ten pages a day, plus editing, footnotes, end notes, and additional research I had not completed. Four days.

That same semester I was nominated for Senior Colloquium. This is a program at Wake where seniors are nominated by members of the faculty to write end-of-the-year speeches. These are submitted to a faculty panel, then narrowed down to 15 or so. These 15 students attend a dinner at the President’s house and give their speeches to a group of trustees, faculty, and the President and his wife. From there the students are whittled down to three, each of whom speaks as part of graduation activities. It’s a great honor. I was nominated by one of my favorite people at Wake Forest, Chaplain Ed Christman. It was an honor, but I was so busy procrastinating on my honors thesis that I didn’t bother to write my speech until the day it was due.

It took me 15 minutes. I was selected to attend the President’s dinner, and then selected as one of the three who would give his speech at the colloquium in May. For a speech that I wrote in 15 minutes and did not edit. I reread that speech recently, as I included it in a portfolio I submitted for a job application (look! I can write speeches!). Upon reviewing the work I thought it fairly well written, but it was so riddled with typos and amateur mistakes that not only was I shocked that I was chosen to give my speech at President Hearn’s house, I’m kinda surprised I wasn’t expelled from Wake Forest, or shot.

Now, here I am in my last semester of graduate school. I have three huge projects coming up: most important is my thesis novel, which must be 50,000 words, all of publishable quality (read: not a rough draft like in every class I’ve taken, but hey, thanks for teaching me ANYTHING AT ALL ABOUT EDITING). The second is a marketing plan, submission packet and first 50 or so pages of a nonfiction book. I haven’t started this. The third is a large set of revisions to a novel I wrote last year. These are all required for my graduation. 

I’ve got 7,500 words of my thesis novel written. I decided to stay in my cozy, creativity-inspiring little office on campus and work instead of going home, where I would be distracted by my deep need to cuddle with my husband on our incredibly comfy sofa and play with the dog and the Wii. I thought, "It’ll be okay. I’ll get it out."

What have I been doing instead? Watching every single one of these. The second one’s my favorite. 

I am so screwed. You think I can pull off another miracle like I did as an undergraduate? Five years, two inches on my waist and two metric tons of alcohol separate me from that time in my life, but I’ll see what I can do.