My first few weeks working at the paper were stressful. I
had just quit my full-time job at a place I’d worked at for three years.
Suddenly I was surrounded by so many strangers. And these strangers were loud. There
was so much movement, so much commotion. There was a TV right by my desk that
vacillated among the news stations. It always seemed like the broadcasters were
yelling at me. People milled about and I struggled to focus. And I had no idea
how to edit a newspaper.
But then I adjusted. And I fell completely in love with the
newsroom. I loved the quick pace of the work there. The high pressure. The
tight deadlines. The complete lack of privacy.
Without question the people there were the best part. These
loud, opinionated, honest people became some of my closest friends (some of
whom would leave me sticky notes when I wasn’t there simply to tell me they
missed me). I began to see myself in them.
In the newsroom you have to speak up or you will get drowned
out. You have to yell across the room to get someone’s attention. You have to
back up your opinion. If you don’t have an opinion, you truly have no place in
the newsroom. I wasn’t a loud person before I worked in the newsroom. I wasn’t
prone to raise my voice. Well, that is certainly no longer the case.
For myriad reasons, grad school was (and still is) a time
when I felt stretched to my limit in every way. The newsroom was my haven. It’s
where I would go when I needed a social outlet after a long stretch of solitary
studying. It’s where I went to complain about boys (obviously). It’s where I
went to feel completely loved and accepted. Because there I was completely
loved and accepted.
As I became more comfortable with my newsroom family, I
found that I also became more comfortable with myself. I came to know myself in
a new way. I became a truer version of myself.
I had an exit interview with my boss a couple weeks ago. He
expressed his gratitude to me for my time at the newsroom. I tried to express
just how dear the newsroom is to me, but I started to get emotional so,
obviously to stave of tears in front of my boss, I stumbled through some lame
response.
Working in the newsroom was easily one of the best things
that has happened in my life. I will never forget my time there and the
beautiful people who changed me.
Newsroom forever.
