I’m back from the dead. I’ve been a neglectful blogger… call me a deadbeat.
Quick update on the past few months in the world of amateur journalism: I survived spring term relatively unscathed. I passed all my classes (first time that’s happened in several terms), secured two internships for the next six months (which I was terrified about, I had no luck/new prospects until about a month ago), and kind of started to rearrange my life. I started thinking about the future, and about how a year from now, I’ll be an adult.
I went home to Woodinville last weekend, and while I was showering in my clean, spacious shower that never seems to run out of hot water, I realized that I will probably never live at home again for more than a few weeks at a time. This summer, due to the fact that I was lucky enough to procure a makeshift internship at the Capital Press (a 35,000 circulation agriculture weekly — probably the West’s most prominent ag paper), I’m living in Corvallis and making the 50 minute commute to Salem each morning. Thanks to another stroke of luck and timing, I’ll be interning at The Oregonian as an academic reporting intern during fall term.
The thought that I’ll never live under my parents’ roof for any extended period of time again is terrifying. Maybe there will be a period after I graduate when I won’t be able to find a job and will just move back in, but for some reason I don’t think that will happen, even though I shamelessly want to. I know my parents would welcome me and love me and feed me milk and home-cooked meals, but I’m sure they would want to set up a vague date of when my welcome as a freeloader in their home would officially expire. Until then I would just feel the clock in the back of my brain ticking like a time bomb for every week that I lived as a deadbeat daughter.
All of my roommates and most of my friends graduated last Saturday. The majority of them have plans for even higher levels of education. The ones who don’t have a very solid idea of what they’ll be doing with their time in the next few months, and some already have enviable jobs lined up.
But what does an underdog journalist with a degree in new media communications from OSU do? I could be like a few of my friends and former Barometer editors and apply to the best and brightest grad programs for young reporters across the country. If I were as talented as some of them, I would get picked up by a major publication fresh out of college and at least make some money traveling and freelancing. As far as journalism goes, I know there are more gritty, aggressive young reporters out there. I’ve always been a good writer, and I ask good questions, but that doesn’t necessarily translate to Pulitzer-winning journalistic skills. I am organized, and if nothing else, stubbornly tenacious. That’s what I have.
The reason I began on this blog post was kind of a reflection of what I’ve learned in my first week of working at the Capital Press. So far, the internship has already been incredibly valuable. Last week, since their head copy editor is on vacation, I’ve been helping to fill in on the copy desk. I’ve learned that I’m more detail-oriented than I ever thought I was, and I love doing layout and working on page design, even if it is on Quark — which crashes even more frequently than InDesign. I’ve also figured out that I have a lot to learn… and have kind of realized that reporting is what I ultimately want to do. But regardless, if I get to work in a newsroom, I think I’ll be happy.
I really like copy editing in general, but it’s so much more stressful than reporting, it’s unbelievable. I could never appreciate that fact until this past week. I would like to take this moment to bow down to all the real world copy editors who have to both edit stories and do pagination. You basically wait around for the talented reporting super stars of the paper to get their work done and then scramble like hell to grace a page with their copy. God forbid you should have to cut a few words or change their headline because it won’t fit.
(I should note that none of these writers have that sort of ego at all, but I can see why all the real-world copy editors I’ve ever known are always stressed out and pissed off. The pressure to edit every mistake out of a story and then strategically place it so it fits, pops and makes sense to the reader on the page — and the fear of screwing it up — are hard to get used to.)
It was different doing the job of a copy editor or layout designer at the Barometer… either you edit copy or you lay out pages, and all your pages can jump, so who cares if you can’t fit someone’s whole story that they spent an entire month researching on one page?
Another thing that’s hard for me to swallow about the copy editing role: You’re literally inside all day. Last summer when I interned at the Gazette-Times, there was never a day when I didn’t get to leave the newsroom and either walk or drive to somewhere in Corvallis and interview people — usually outside. I spent a few days at the Benton County fair, da Vinci Days, and any other outdoor festival I felt like covering.
As a copy editor, you don’t get to run around town, drive different places, meet people that you would have never interacted with otherwise and talk about their lives, their work, their passion, or the things they’ve accomplished, often in the face of crippling adversity. You don’t get to visit their homes and look at their pictures or sit in their kitchens and feel them unwind. You don’t get to talk to their kids, or meet their pets, or listen and scribble down notes as they teach you, front to back, about something their entire world revolves around. In copy editing, the human factor just isn’t there. Mind you, the human factor is often a pain in the ass, but it’s the reason most journalists do what they do — because we’re story tellers. We love sharing information, and above all, we love to learn.
In my second week at the CapPress, I’ll still be doing a good amount of page layout and editing, but since the chief copy editor will be back I’ll probably be thrown into writing stories, or getting coffee, or shining shoes, or something. You know, odd jobs. And while waking up at 6:10 every morning has been a relative pain (I’m nocturnal), I think it’ll work out in my advantage in preparation for the day when I …gulp… grow up and have a… um… real job.
Shuddercringebarf.
Adventures in the News Hole 
When loosed upon the world, tenacity and passion can be a whirlwind of success. Combine these with organization and I bet you’ll have a typhoon of prosperity. Regardless of whether you pursue “higher education” beyond an undergraduate degree, keep the furnaces flaming and the engines driving.
I have no doubt that someday you’ll be cradling a Pulitzer in your cupped hands.