When I started writing for The Daily Barometer in January 2008, it was because I was bored, I loved writing, I was a voracious consumer of news and I needed extra pocket money. Originally I thought I would write a column, but due to the misunderstood Baro black hole which consumes reporters and leaves the news editor in constant desperation for writers, I got lassoed into the news section.
By the time I was doing four or five stories a week on top of being a full time student and a member of the OSU cross country team, I was addicted. As Dan Rather once said, “Be careful. Journalism is more addictive than crack cocaine. Your life can get out of balance.” I don’t exactly doubt that Mr. Rather was qualified to make comparisons to the addictive nature of illegal drugs, and I can sort of relate (to clarify, I was not in D.C. in the late ’80s and I have never done crack cocaine). When writing is something that you love to do and you’ve been reprimanded since childhood for your “rude” habit of constantly asking highly personal, to-the-point questions, there really is no other future than journalism.
It really is a (sexy) death trap. It seduces you with its exhilarating promises of justice, honesty and unbiased facts and lulls you into the belief that you could do this, just like this, for the rest of your life. But it’s a machine, an addition to your life, and you constantly have to feed it. You change your major to suit its appetite, and your own. You ignore the possibility of any other careers, jobs or even internships and you zero in on the few opportunities that thousands of other journalism students are scrapping over. You work hard, you gain experience and then you graduate and wonder what you’re going to do now — now that you long since dropped your business major and there are no journalism jobs to be had.
But, like so many of us, I am in love, not in lust. Therefore, since I am basically qualified to do nothing else (aside from making blizzards at Dairy Queen), I will forge on through the mass of stinging nettle bushes that is the apparent path to a career in journalism and hold my head high. I will apply for every internship I can find and continue to freelance. I will stay in touch with the Barometer and work there in some capacity, and I will blog, and I will write. I will cling to my AP Stylebook, always keep a red pen handy, and never miss an opportunity to offer someone a manila envelope with my resume and the obligatory five to seven clips stored neatly inside.
And if, after years of relentless and desperate job hunting, it doesn’t work out, I will never, ever turn to PR.
Adventures in the News Hole 