This is a picture of me and Melissa taken in July 2005. It was a lovely, sunny winter's day and we went walking from Muizenberg to St James, where this photo was taken. I remember the day vividly and have a copy of this photo on the bookshelf in my room - so I look at it everyday. It was a happy day, just like the weather. My Dad was still alive, although most of us knew he was moving towards the end of his life. I was also in the middle of my MPhil at UCT getting ready to interview my student participants.
Looking at this picture yesterday I realised - that I am no longer that person in the photo any more. I have changed. I have been changed. My first thought after that realisation was that this PhD has changed me. This process has to change you - you are never the same person you were at the start of it all. One could argue that life, time changes you - sure I would agree with that, but in many ways placing yourself into a process like a PhD accentuates change, brings it up for microscopic investigation. And at that moment, conscious of the transformation(s) taking hold of me, I am aware of what went before. Of the person in this photo, of the life depicted in this photo that isn't any long in the way it was at the time and place the photo was taken - that sunny day in July 2005 on St James beach, Cape Town. I miss that alive person, with responsibilities and interest in family, friends, students. Who had at that time a fulfilling job and was hungry to learn more about how my students were learning. I'm not so sure I have retained all that enthusiasm to learning more about my students' learning (well I don't have any students to start with). The abstract, decontextualised posturing I've been engaged with for the past year...well enough said.
The old, well worn cliche that the only constant in life is change is so damningly true. And in a very strange but reassuring way I want to go back to being that woman on the beach captured perfectly in this photo - just for a moment, maybe 10 minutes, so I can feel that sun, hold my niece and feel my place in the world.
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