Week 6: "OH MY GOD!"

"Oh my God!" was what I said over and over again in my head Wednesday when I realized I would be going to the Billy Joel/Elton John Face 2 Face concert which was yesterday at the Ford Center. Coming from a dad who loves Billy Joel and a mom who loves both, I knew seeing them would be legendary! Seeing two iconic, talented musicians from mid-range ticket seat in an arena, what could be cooler?!

Thursday night, I found out what was. Writing a review for the Oklahoma Gazette's Web site, I was just happy to be getting free tickets to go to a concert I had been wanting to go for about year. When my friend Jamie Birdwell and I looked in the envelope to see where we were sitting, we freaked out!

"WE ARE ON THE FLOOR, FOURTH ROW!"

The concert started with so much anticipation in the room, it felt like a balloon with too much air inside.

Needless to say, I had a blast at the concert and Elton John looked at Jamie and myself, then blew us a kiss, probably because we were the youngest people in the first 10 rows...

To read what I officially thought of the concert, click here to view my review for the Oklahoma Gazette.

Week 5: Source trouble

Don't you hate it when people don't get back with you when you need them to? Occupational hazard that someone you need to talk to doesn't get back with you in a timely manner.

In most every other occupation, it's alright to let the person who is trying to get a hold of you wait a day and a half to get back with the information, but if that person is a journalist, you better believe they are muttering curses upon you. Nothing personal, but with deadlines hanging over our heads, it's hard to think pleasant thoughts for you.

Part of being a journalist is relying on other people to get back with you, so you can further your story. Without those people, a story is dead and lifeless. It's all-together boring.

No particular reason why for this post, but I find this problem quite annoying. So, you non-journalists out there, if a journalist calls, please call back soon or be okay with having someone not being your biggest fan for a while.

Week 4: Working at the Capitol

The more I have immersed myself into my chosen career path, the more I realized you either find yourself loving or hating your decision. The further I walk down the line, the more I love my choice. Working on a frustrating story for the past two weeks with elusive legislators, I finally was able to get comments, by going to a committee hearing.

Now, if you have ever seen a movie where someone is speaking to a federal committee, with legislators sitting, facing toward the people giving their testimony and a crowd sitting in rows facing the committee, it was nothing at all like that. Instead, we have a group of people sitting in a circle, chatting with one another and everyone else sitting in a bigger circle around them.

Thursday, the Senate Health and Human Services Committee met and discussed bills. The hearing was 2 hours long. I loved it.

Am I crazy? Possibly.

How can I possibly find any of what was going on in a two hour long meeting interesting? First off, the legislation discussed effects the state and second, the people there were just entertaining.

Now, that is in no way demeaning the fine people we have voted to represent us, but if people are expected to sit in a meeting, someone needs to say something interesting. And believe me, many interesting things were said in that meeting.

"How far will we continue?"

Curious? Read my article in the Oklahoma Gazette on Wednesday to find out. :)

Week 3: Stepping out of element

One of the things I love about journalism is you get the opportunity to always be uncomfortable. What I mean is, when you cover a story, you go to events you would never go to on your own, talk to people who would never cross your path otherwise and experience new cultures and norms. Whenever I report a hard issue or need to immerse myself into a different world, I feel that if I don't feel uncomfortable, I'm not doing my job right. I'm in no way judging what I'm seeing but rather letting it all sink in. With my discomfort is the urge of me wanting to understand what is going on around me better.

This week, I was very uncomfortable but not in a way that I'm accustomed to. As a news writer, I go out, talk to people, write down what I'm told and string it together to make a story and give it out to the people in hopes that they can make up their own mind on what is going on and do something about it. I try to make these stories enjoyable but the main goal is to inform and I understand they want news and will go elsewhere for entertainment.

This week, I was on the other side of the editorial office. I wrote my first ever full length life and arts feature on a singer-songwriter. Now, I have written personality profiles before but they were all coming from a news standpoint with a big news hook or an underlying issue. I have never written a story where my goal was to entertain (minus the fiction I tried to write when I was in grade school).

Interviewing was easy. The singer was so nice and accommodating. It was a blast talking to her.

Being a newbie, I decided to read old stories that is standard at the Gazette when it comes to music stories. What I read were stories so crafted and well-worded that I could sort of hear the music in my head or at least had an idea of what it sounded like.

I freaked.

"I have never written anything like that in my life!" I thought to myself. These stories were not only personality profiles on the individuals but rather reviews of their music as well. For so long, I have trained myself not to insert my opinion in my work that I felt like I forgot how to go about something like that. I'm afraid I made myself literally sick over it.

When I sat down to write, I felt blocked. I didn't know where to start. For the first time in more than four years, I honestly had no idea how to write. I never had that problem before. Writing had become second nature to me. Give me the information and I could get you a completed story within the hour. I knew the formula, I knew what words to use, I knew what to write to grab my reader.

With this story, I took a hard swallow and just wrote as well as I could, giving it my best. I wouldn't let my editor down and have him running around trying to fill the space. I could beat it or at least fight it!

Moral of the story: I took a step out of my writing element and I survived! It just makes me believe more so than ever that you HAVE TO get out of your element to become a better journalist.

This will not be the last time for me. I am set to write a few more life stories in the future and hopefully, I'll find my groove and I'm so glad. Instead of being flat, I'm getting the opportunity to become more well-rounded.

First impressions

These past two weeks have been a whirlwind. Trying to get settled in at school and learning the ropes at my internship. Whew.

At the Oklahoma Gazette, the editorial interns (Luke Atkinson and I) are left to complete the Hey! Do This (HDT) section and the little mini stories that shortly follow that section; we call them floaters.

Luke and I have decided to switch off doing floaters and doing HDT every week. They're not that difficult to do and both of us have been able to hit these things out of the ballpark in less than a day.

With that being said, this internship is very hands on and we are continually given the opportunities to write and cultivate our clipbook. At this point, we are both working on a few full-length stories for the Gazette. Right now, I'm finishing off with a feature on a Oklahoma City singer-songwriter and a legislative story. Hopefully, if all goes according to plan, these stories will run in the Feb. 10 edition of the Gazette.

Anyway, back to work!