ABD, baby!

I defended my dissertation proposal today, and despite last night's crushing doubts of "Oh crap I'm not ready to do this, I'm not nearly as smart as I like to think I am," it went off without a hitch. Woohoo! I was apprehensive about having an English prof on my examination committee, not specific to her but a reaction to my incredibly confrontational M.A. defense a few years ago with another English department examiner. Silly fears - she paid me the most amazing compliment I've ever received in school: that she thought my work was fantastic and wished she had come up with it so she could do it. All of the questions tended toward "This idea is neat, can you talk about it some more." Boy could I. So now I'm ABD (all but dissertation), which is only a hop, skip, and a couple hundred pages away from the holy grail. I love loving what I do, obscene debt be damned. And I'm excited - to finally be able to start writing, but first to go out and celebrate this evening. Once more, for good measure: woohoo!