The Last Word

I cannot believe that it has been two years since I first read about this idea at my then still ABD virtual friend Yvette's blog (thank you so much for writing a whole post for me, BTW, my friend).

Anyway, Yvette saw this post and decided to take up the challenge and write her dissertation's last word even before it was finished because she loved this question from that post:

What's the last word in your dissertation?*[. . .] *For those of you still--or not yet--writing a dissertation, what word would you like to be the last word? It might be fun to record it here and then write to it. Voila.

At the time, I was not brave enough to try to guess what the word would be, so I waited. Almost two full years (May 16, 2006 was the day Yvette wrote her post).

So, here it is:

ACCOMPLISHMENT.

I may share the whole last paragraph later, it's pretty short, but I'll leave you with this now.

I have written down the whole odyssey of the dissertation submission and I hope to post it. I haven't forgotten about the photos from the defense, and I need to update my photo blog.

But for now, I want this word to stand:

accomplishment

It has certainly been a great accomplishment to finish this dissertation. We stayed up until 3 am last night again and I worked several hours today to finalize the revisions and I'm going to upload it on Monday morning, when I am at the university (I'm going there for a graduate student conference, I was supposed to be there tonight, but we'll only go tomorrow).

So, tell me, if you've completed a dissertation: what was your last word?
Or, if you're still working on it, what word do you want to be your last word?