The Monumental Day...or not so much

Today was the day, the defining moment in a student's university experience, the moment all of your time of (sometimes questionable) learning has lead up: The Dissertation. After a year of deciding on a topic, going through hours of research, trying to form some sort of comprehensive argument, and trying to get my head round how to reference all of these witty quotations I'd come across - today was the day I finally handed it in.

Now, I know larger and larger proportions of society are going and getting themselves one of these degree thingies at the moment, but with the amount of stress, worry and sleepless nights some of my housemates and I went through over these projects, it was like we were the first people ever to do them. And we're the fairly organised ones that have given them in early, who knows about these others that have been rumored to be living in the campus library now; their skin pale and oily, rings around their eyes, and shaking hands from an overload of caffeine having only just started to research their topic a couple of weeks before the due date. 

No, I wasn't one of these people, I could have stretched out working on it until Monday, but the truth is I'm so sick of the sight of the thing that I just wanted it out of my life. And did that bring me relief? Well, not really. Firstly, I'm still worrying about the damn thing even after I've given it in - is there anything else I should have done? Why don't I have as many references as other people? Secondly, the feeling of being free from this weight that has been pulling at the back of my mind for so long is a little unsettling - I sat watching some celebratory daytime tv earlier feeling like a naughty schoolgirl - surely I should be doing something else? And thirdly, even though I was organised enough to give it in early, the very thought of doing so made me forget all of my things for my afternoon seminar, which put an extra 40 minutes of very speedy walking time home and back to campus, and quite frankly, rather than going out to party I'd rather collapse in bed!

So much for Britain's youth of today being manic and out of control, I'll be asleep by 11!