Comps

This weekend I'm going to be shutting down all other activity that doesn't directly relate to my comps. The first wave of preparations involved getting the paper written, due about two weeks ago. After nearly killing myself working crazy-late hours for about a fortnight, I handed it in on time. I was supposed to hear back from the professors this week about whether they'll be giving me the thumbs-up to go ahead with the defense, scheduled for March 10th. (No word yet. If they don't tell me today... um, yeah. I got nothin' but empty threats. *sigh*) So I'm going to work on the assumption that they're just bowled over by the sheer genius of it and prepare for D-Day on Tuesday.

So, quick recap: the paper presented a case from initial intake through assessment, treatment planning, and therapy progress. Tuesday I will be given half an hour to make a professional presentation of the case (just as I would if I were working with a team at, say, a psychiatric hospital). I will then be grilled by three professors for about an hour, on everything from why I made a particular diagnosis given the unusual MMPI profile to how I envision the Catholic anthropological premises being played out in the dynamics of the person's psychic functioning. (...yeah, I know. Pompous, but it sounds good at cocktail parties.)

Well, I thought, in exchange for demanding that every single person who reads this blog pray for me at 1pm on Tuesday, I would leave you with some E.B. White. How I love his stuff.

Up early today, trying to decide whether or not to bequeath our brain to our alma mater, which is making a collection of such stuff. It struck us as odd that the decision will have to be made by the brain itself and that no other part of us -- a foot or a gall bladder -- can be in on the matter, although all are, in a way, concerned. Our head is small, and we fear that our brain may suffer by comparison if arranged on a shelf with others. Spent part of the morning composing an inscription to go with our brain, but all we got was this:

Observe, quick friend, this quiet noodle,
The kit removed from its caboodle.
Here sits a brain at last unhinged,
On which too many thoughts impinged.

--"Daylight and Darkness" from The Second Tree from the Corner.