Drafting.

Did you know that there are at least thirteen definitions for draft? And that's only on the Merriam Webster Online Dictionary. AND that's only for its noun form. Heaven only knows what might have happened to my brain tonight if I had access to the OED from my apartment. 

I've come to appreciate turning in drafts to our professors here. If it weren't for those deadlines, there is a good chance that I may not have been as far into the paper as I am right now. The kind of drafting we are doing is pretty close to the second definition of the transitive verb form: "[drawing] the preliminary sketch, version, or plan of" (MWOD). But I'd like to think of them as being closest to the fifth definition of the noun form, which calls a draft a scheme. It's true--we are scheming! We have each found projects and topics that excite the kind of passion in us that independent research fosters. The scheming comes in when we work to get others excited about the project, and prove to them that our arguments are worth reading and discussing.

I was working on this week's thirty-page draft today when I first thought to myself, "What does it even *mean* to draft?!" There is a very simple way to answer that question. But that's no fun. So, quite naturally, I looked up the word's definition. Finding out that I needed to scroll down the page to read all of the definitions, I started thinking about what some of these various drafts have meant for me this semester. 

I can identify with definitions 1-6, 9, and 11-13 of the noun form, and definitions 1 and 2 of the verb form. (Some of the identifications are a stretch, but where there's a will, there's a way. Many of the definitions use terms that make it so easy to use creative liberties.)

The thirty-page draft is due in T minus five days. The forty-page draft is due in T minus fifteen days. The paper is due in T minus twenty-nine days.

This program offers us many worlds. Not only are we writing these research papers, but we are living in a fabulous city, taking a seminar with great professors, spending a semester away from our campuses (and becoming familiar with what that even means for--and to--us), and experiencing some serious intellectual growth, to name a few things. But still, especially these days, I'm missing many of the great people in my life.

I missed my grandmother's call on Sunday, because I was out to dinner at an excellent Ethiopian restaurant with six other people in the program. Being the sports fanatic that she is, my grandmother left a message letting me know that her Cleveland Cavaliers were going to beat my Chicago Bulls. My immediate response when I called her back was, "When exactly did they become my Chicago Bulls? and does that mean that, somehow, I've lost my status as a Clevelander because I've been away?" She laughed.

In a little under five weeks, on a Sunday, I'll be back in Cleveland. Today, when I realized that our time here is winding down, I got really sad. I've met some great people here, and it will be weird to not be around them once this program is over. 

I'm already finding comfort in the fact that, for at least a few weeks, I'll be going back to some of the things and people I've missed the most. 

This evening, four of us watched The Sting, and, as always, we laughed and joked with one another, while still managing to pay close attention to the movie. I'm already missing these small types of things with this group of people, and I'm not even gone yet. 

On another note, I won't miss the significant draft (henh. Forgive me, but it's true!) that comes through my window, even though it's closed. Partly because I'm anticipating the warmth that being around my closest friends from Ohio will bring me, just before I head off to do this thing all over again in England.