The process of diss editing is moving slowly forward. It has been gratifying to find how relatively polished my early drafts were � it really has been just a matter of proofreading and filling in a few holes, with a little minor reorganization to avoid repetition (this has been a challenge, as I�ve overlaid a chronological with a geographical framework). It�s interesting to find that in filling in the holes I�m finding even more evidence to support both my theories and my approach. This shouldn�t surprise me, but it is reassuring, for I feel that I am more than on the right track.

The holes I left the first time through were mostly sections where I needed to refer to something that I knew had already been researched by someone else and was sufficiently well established and sufficiently tangential to my own work, that I felt no obligation to do the work myself. Many of them are connections I felt compelled to make because there is so little extant literature to which I can refer on my topic, that I want to network with studies of areas that are even a little related for maximum impact. Now that I�m mostly finished and am going back to look at these works a second time, I�m seeing them from a different perspective. Last time my theories weren�t fully formed. Now these works are looking more and more relevant and less like a contrived obligatory mention.

I guess what I�m saying is that I never really thought I�d be happy with my dissertation � I never think I�ve done enough work or thinking about things. But I�m actually feeling pretty happy with it at the moment and consequently am not nearly as worried about what my committee will say.

I�m sure all this good feeling will change when it comes time to get my bibliography in order. There�s no way that�s going to be fun. Thank God for Endnote.

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Thanks to those who responded to my late entry yesterday on our investigations into schools for AJ and Waldorf education. I responded to the lot of you in a comment on that entry. Because I�m too lazy to email everyone, that�s why.

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