I looked up amidst a pile of papers and there we suddenly were. Passengers had disembarked and more had got on. The doors were closed and whistles were blowing signalling imminent departure when I suddenly registered the 'East Croydon' sign leapt from my seat, grabbed suitcase, rucksack and documents and yelled at a startled woman to, 'Open the door, open the DOOR!'
I had been travelling on the 10.02 from Billingshurst, transferring to the Cambridge line for Farringdon at East Croydon; ultimate destination: Norwich and a writing retreat at Belsey Bridge.
What does this have to do with the doctorate?
Well, my supervisors have been going on about the need to be 'raking through' my data over and over again. But I know my data, I thought: I've lived it, breathed it, transcribed it, read it, annotated it, coded it, discussed it, shared it. That's 'raking through', surely?
Feedback on early drafts of findings chapters has praised the big ideas (hooray - I have ideas!) while criticising the lack of supporting data as evidence. And on one occasion where I offered five examples (that's a lot, for me), it was suggested that I hadn't 'done enough' with them.
My first supervisor suggested that the solution might lie in tabulating the data, and suggested a couple of places where I might insert a table. Now, the vignettes suggestion in my last post was really productive, but this was even more helpful. It means that I really do have to, yes, 'rake through' the data in order to amass the information for tabulation.
It is utterly absorbing and I lose all sense of time and space and awareness of an outside world when I am immersed in doing it - which is what I was doing to provoke the very uncharacteristic East Croydon incident.
But I get it now. And I understand, finally, why everyone keeps telling me that this is the good bit!
And I'm safely on the 12.00 from Liverpool Street, and Norwich is the end of the line: so I think I'm safe for the final leg!
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