GEBORGENHEIT - Ben Hardy as Roger Taylor

The thesis

First chapter

The wind was slightly opening the window and cold air came through it approaching the desk. It was starting to get cold and Madeline just kept looking at the outside lost in thought. How was she supposed to hand in advances of her thesis if she had not decided on a topic. The only thing that she was certain about, was that she wanted to talk and do a research on phonological features but that was it. Madeline had no other thing in mind, and it could not be just about that, it was just too broad that she would die trying.

She sighed and walked across the room and closed the big window that was in her room, gathered her things, put in a coat and headed downstairs for a quick lunch. It was not news when she realized there was nothing to do for breakfast, she had been extremely absorbed in her work that she had not even gone to get some groceries. She just grabbed a what first came in to her sight, an apple that was in the table and without looking back she headed to the door and closed it.

Winter was approaching the city, she loved cold weather but until certain level of coldness, at some point she was not able to handle it. She was walking down the empty streets that only her shoes were the only thing that could be heard aside from the sounds of the wind and the leaves making music along with it. She loved to walk, having a car was not something she needed, she preferred getting into the train and besides traffic was not something she liked to bear with. She liked living alone but it was a little bit tedious she was starting to feel lonely. Madeline had a boyfriend that at the moment was out of town. Jake had been doing an investigation at the other side of the world, in Italy to be exact. He was now doing his PhD in cultural differences within swiss Italians and Italians from Italy. She could see that he was having the time of his life since he had been there 6 months now and as far as she knew he would be there for at least 6 other months. She was proud, but she wished she could be doing something as big as that, instead, she was stuck in New York. Do not get her wrong, of course she loved New York, it was the big apple after all, but she did not like big cities, she preferred small towns in the outsides.

She finally arrived to her university to meet her thesis advisor and once professor of her stance in New York University. She loved her times there, after all that is where she met Jake, they were both studying a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics, she was from the area of applied linguistics and Jake was from the area of cultural and historical linguistics, but they still managed to see each other in some classes, that is how they met. They were similar, they both liked simple things and were calm, they just stayed as simple as possible.

"Good Morning Mr. Woodsman, did I keep you long?" Madeline asked as she opened the door of her advisor's office.

"Not at all dear Madeline, how is your thesis going?" The professor asked wondering how she was doing

Madeline took a seat in front of the professor's desk and looked down, she did not know what to say, she had nothing yet. She had to be true to her professor since he was the only person that trusted her to be a great linguist in the future. She was about to graduate, and she needed to finish this thesis in order for them to give her the degree that she desired with all her heart.

He looked amused as he knew Madeline was uncertain about her thesis, he knew she was very smart, but she just could not see it. It was hard to think of a topic to cover whole bunch of information about a certain thing, not being to broad. There were many things in the world that contained phonologic patterns, he knew Madeline will come with an idea eventually, not just yet. For instance, he had to give her some ideas, as her assessor, it was his duty after all.

"I see" Mr. Woodsman said nodding his head. "There is no rush, after all, it is your time Madeline, you know when you want to get that degree of yours, it is up to you" he added trying to persuade her to think faster and dig deep in her thoughts. She just needed a little push.