Tom

One of my office mates is in the last year of his PhD. He started a year before I did, but was out of it for one year because of “depression”. He was back for a few weeks before it got announced that he was quitting. He’s done all the empirical research and jumped through all the hoops. The last thing he needs to do is commit to six months of writing up. I haven’t seen him in a while, and everybody keeps telling me not to mention the topic to him when I do see him, because he is overcome by a massive sense of shame. He is also getting married this year and is a very committed Christian.

Around me nobody wants to do shit. “He must have thought about it”. “Maybe God is doing something with him, you don’t know”… I want to have coffee with him and yell at him: “Tom, fucking hell Tom what the hell is wrong with you? Just write up with me, I’m writing up too: we can meet up everyday. Just finish this, you’ve done most of it, it’s five and a half years of your life, hang on in there”. What would you do?