It is done!

I sit here for the last time in a residence room as a student in the summer distance program at the Atlantic School of Theology. It is almost a surreal experience. I can hear the voices of other students laughing down the hallway as they share a meal together, as we do every weekday morning. We will be going down the hill in a few minutes for the final chapel service of this summer session. It will be a time of good bye, and for some of us that means that we will not be returning next year.

I will be leaving as soon as possible today because I changed my travel plans and I am now driving to Kingston and then boarding the train for Winnipeg tomorrow later afternoon. There was something inside me this summer that stirred me from flying back to Winnipeg on Saturday and so I am taking a day, to travel across northern Ontario, where there will be no internet and a cell signal only rarely, so that I might settle into the new reality of being done the summer portion of my program. It is going to be different.

Our last course this summer has been Graduate Research and Seminar, in which we were required to do about 3 months worth of work in 2 weeks. The next few months will be extremely busy for all of us as we try to do our research (interviews), transcribe the interviews, code our data, and interpret the results, only to present them in a public presentation at the end of November. It will be busy, but it is almost done. Currently we have competed 27/30 credits, it is amazing.

I will see you all on Tuesday morning back at the church.

Peace,

Patrick