I submitted my final term paper of the semester last evening at 10:30 p.m. What a relief hitting that "Upload File" button! That paper was a lot of work – a 10 page critical piece on a book. I poured source after source into it, ensuring it would cement what I think will be an A in that course. Crossing fingers.

This was the single toughest semester of my grad school career. When I first saw the length of the three syllabi I thought for certain I'd have to drop one of the courses, but I perservered with a lot of stupidity resolve. And it meant making a lot of sacrifices, spending hours upon hours studying and having anxiety attacks.

Relief!

Never have I had so many papers to write and books to read in one semester, including my undergraduate career as a literature major. I can't even tell you how many. I lost track. And the papers were big, requiring lots of research and much pulling out of hair.

I missed one small assignment this semester, worth only a couple of points, but otherwise I completed everything. The secret was to take it week by week, paper by paper. One of the papers I started almost immediately, as it didn't require learning something in advance. It was a bibliography of 25 articles related to subjects librarians should know – things like new technology, eBooks, demographics, that sort of thing, plus an essay on how I found the information, what trends I noticed, etc. Easy enough if you start it early. That wound up being a good move as it saved me having to scramble at the end.

Still basking in the glow; it feels unreal. But I'll get used to it quickly. Now comes that long wait for the grades – biting nails. They should be in by next week, hopefully. And, the decision on where to spend my practicum – working eight hours a week at another library, for a full semester – and one final course. What a breeze that will be compared to this semester!

Ahhhhh……!