I am sitting here on this rainy Sunday morning….a little too early because the cat was sure she had to eat NOW… in a very good mood. As I think I wrote last, I was in a panic over my thesis a little over a week ago. I was working on my fifth chapter when I realized I might not be able to prove the ultimate argument of my whole thesis. I tore my files apart looking for a list of just about ten names that were the clincher to everything…the clincher to several years of painstaking research, years of travel to Mississippi (not that the trips were painful in any way), years of analyzing data and reading every book I could lay my hands on published about yellow fever since the 1820s. Yes, that is quite a few works. They don’t call me the disease queen for nothing!
Anyway… my dear friend who lives in Natchez took time out of her weekend to go to the Historic Natchez Foundation for me yesterday and get that ever important list of names. I spent an hour or so last night perusing the Census records from 1850 and 1860 for these all important men. In my excitement I found exactly what I was looking for. They all were exactly what I thought they were… Natchez merchants. Just that small word made everything fall into place. And so, this week will be spent crafting chapter five. I still have to put together chapter two on the Natchez doctors, but that one will practically write itself. I don’t know how to express how happy I am to have that light at the end of the tunnel shining a little brighter today.
Now I can enjoy going to brunch and to the movies with my girls today knowing that tomorrow I can begin to really get closer to the end.
bunny notes 