Well this is Mt. Kilimanjaro in all of its glory- and where did we left off in Christine’s story of climbing it? Oh yes! She was just starting to summit and as the title of this blog suggests, the summit was not a pleasant time.

As they were climbing, Christine had barely seen the peak of the mountain, with the fog hiding it. But today she could see they weren’t so far away anymore, the glaciers and snow at the top peak were growing closer. As she packed, she placed her clothes inside of her sleeping bag so they would absorb her body heat and stay warm in the freezing temperatures.

“One of the guides came to my tent with the news that Serifin would be guiding us on summit day, the only person I would want to. He warns me that the first hill will be the hardest but after that the rest will be easy. If it wasn’t true he gave me permission to throw rocks at him. It ended up not being true.”

With the stress of the summit looming over her head, Christine could not sleep. It was extremely windy that night that by the time one of the porters came to shake her tent and wake her up, Christine panicked, assuming the tent must be flipping over.

“I thought maybe I should talk to Serifin about my fears. But I already knew exactly what he would say, his response to everything, “Don’t think. Drink more water.” This calmed me down and eventually I fell asleep.”

Waking up the next morning and walking 8 hours to the rim of the volcano was all a blur. Inside the volcano was a ramp the group would have to climb to reach the top. Once everyone had made it over the dreaded first hill, the trail became a switchback, where members walked in a zigzag pattern instead of straight up the hill to make the climb less steep.

“My eyes soon met a sea of headlamps in front of me, climbers from other groups. The full moon and stars also helped to light up the path, calming me. The switchbacks in the dark were hypnotizing. Why? I don’t remember.”

“But the wind. The wind would take the breath out of you. I fixed my eyes on the green backpack in front of me and thought, “if he can keep walking so can I.” But that wind made me feel like an airplane during turbulence: unsettled. I kept telling myself it was just an inconvenience, not a problem. Unless Serifin says you can go down, you are going to keep climbing up.”

Christine had 3 options: stop and go back down (in the wind), stop and take a break on the side of the mountain (in the wind), or keep moving. She chose the lesser of the three evils, which would take her out of the wind sooner.

The group continued its climb in the pitch darkness. While walking switchbacks on the horizon line Christine looked to the stars for a an answer; were they beginning to fade? But the stars yielded no clues and the climb stretched on, no signs of morning in sight. And then she saw it…

“One single line of red as I turned the corner. Walking towards it I had this moment where I thought, I can’t believe this is the sunrise! I was overwhelmingly filled with joy, crying at its presence. I had made it! I had survived the night and morning was here.”

With each switchback more and more colors, oranges and yellows, start to appear. With each step the sky grew brighter and more of the crater was visible. Christine turned off her headlamp. This indescribable joy was as if she had just survived battle, a battle against the brutal wind.

The group finally reached Stella point, the first part of the crater. At this point Christine was feeling delirious as she dropped to her knees in exhaustion. She reached for her clif bar but it was frozen. She tried to pull out her water but that was frozen too.

“All the guides were high-fiving us and hugging us when Serifin came over to me.“Welcome to my office. What do you think?” I responded, telling him that it was beautiful. Then he confides in me, “So I have to tell my clients this mountain isn’t hard, I tell them that it’s a piece of cake; but it is hard! I do this so that you don’t think about it so much.”’

The guides kept the group moving. They had only one hour left until Uhuru peak, the top of the mountain. When they finally reached the peak, everyone was in high spirits, taking pictures in front of the sign. Uhuru peak translates to independence peak. Christine thought how perfect this was for a student traveler climbing a mountain all by herself. Pretty damn independent.

As the group hiked back down to Stella point, Christine realized she had never thought about what would happen after she reached the top of the mountain. The route down was a volcanic sand path composed of black sand and rocks. The way down? Sliding down the volcanic sand like you would a sand dune.

Christine started picking up speed, going faster and faster, when her head started to ache. Then came the dizziness and nausea. But she had to keep moving, in order to get rid of the altitude sickness she had to get down to a lower altitude.

“I remember Alexis and Lisa were stopped too and the other members of the group were bent over, vomiting. But most vividly I remember Alex throwing up off the side of the mountain, Serifin holding onto her backpack so she wouldn’t fall off. We still had a four hour walk back to camp and all I wanted was to get off this mountain! I wanted the Wi-Fi and I wanted to sleep.”

As the group stopped for an hour, Christine crawled into her tent, stripping herself of her many layers. Her skin was on fire while she wore all of her arctic layers in this new climate zone. She barely made it lunch before she was throwing up.

“Serifin did not care much for my whining. He told me to hurry up and drink my water faster, but I could only manage tiny sips at the time. I snapped, “I could think of a million things I would rather do than hike for four more hours!”’

The climb down was awful to say the least. When they reached the camp Christine fell asleep, only to throw up more the next morning. The group walked its final three hours and reached the last gate. Awaiting them was an area set up with lawn chairs, food, and certificates congratulating them on their accomplishment.

After all that the mountain had thrown at her, all the doubt and uncertainty, Christine was still alive. She walked away feeling that if she could handle Mt. Kilimanjaro, she could handle anything. And so she went onto Cape Town, where she is enjoying the wonderful adventures that Africa has to offer her there. I have never seen her so relaxed and carefree and I know the mountain is to thank.

As I prepare to visit Christine a month from now, I can’t help but feel worried about the trip. I will be traveling solo, across the ocean, to a completely foreign continent! And people have told me its crazy, that the idea is too dangerous. Well, hearing Christine’s story taught me something: we have to take risks in life in order to truly appreciate all that this world has to offer us. We could stay safe never leaving our homes, never trying anything new, but is that really living?

Why worry when life is going to do as it pleases anyways? The worrying won’t make anything stop, it will only make the journey harder on yourself.

There will never be an ideal time to travel. There will always be some sort of conflict going on in the world. We have got to stop playing things so safe. We need to get out and explore the world before we lose our chance to. Taking a step outside our comfort zones, in any way, is important to our mindset. The real struggles we face are often all in our minds and we need to stop getting in our own way! Always remember, “pole, pole,” you can do it.

Jambo, hello again from Africa! Christine is still busy exploring and climbing every part of Cape Town she possibly can. In fact, she just dove off of Bloukran’s Bridge Jump, the world’s tallest bungee jumping bridge. After climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro, Africa’s tallest mountain, what else would we expect?

But let’s get back to the story… Armed with her small backpack and a lunch of mango juice and chicken nuggets, Christine began the climb. The group consisted of three guides, 21 porters who carry personal bags and equipment and six other climbers. Her group was not the only one making the climb. Since January was peak climbing season the group would see many others along the trail.

Christine began to calm down as she met the other climbers and they exchanged stories; the loneliness monster went back into hiding. One of the climbers shared the same name as her mother, Lisa, and another the name of her best friend, Alexis (that would be me). This had to be a sign that everything was going to be just fine! How could it not be, with your mom and best friend hiking alongside you?

Day 1: The Rain forest. Unlike the name suggests, no rain poured as the group climbed through this portion of the mountain. Monkeys leaped from tree to tree as the group climbed stair after stair of mud and roots.

The climbing wasn’t fast, and in fact the mantra of the trip would come to be known as “pole, pole,” which is Swahili for “slowly, slowly.” The slower the climbers moved, the easier it would be for their bodies to acclimate to the changing conditions.

“I heard the people up at camp and grew excited because I knew we were getting closer. After we had registered at the site, we received our tenting partners; I had to tent by myself because there were no other single girls there. I was nervous about being in a tent by myself because then I would have no one to talk to. I realized I was still alone and I didn’t even really know the other people in my group.”

Day 2: More rain forest. Waking up the next morning, it finally sank in that Christine was climbing this mountain. There was no turning back now. At breakfast all of the other group members were taking their altitude medicine for the day. Christine went up to one of the guides, Serifin, to ask if it was necessary that she take the medicine after having had such a violent reaction to it the other night. Serifin suggested she only take one pill instead of the recommended two.

Christine was hesitant to take even the one. How would she climb if she became violently ill again? Regardless, she took the medicine and after ten minutes of being nausea-free she started to calm down. One hour later, still no reaction. As each hour passed she began to feel more at ease; “pole, pole.”

“As we hiked through the rain forest, I kept singing Taylor Swift to myself: ‘Are we out of the woods yet, are we out of the woods?”’

“I was distracted by hiking, I didn’t want to stop. I wanted my mind occupied. My group kept telling me to relax. Serifin asked me, “Are you thinking? Don’t think. It’s a piece of cake! Keep drinking water, you will be okay.” I was trying to, but I was still so nervous. By the time we reached camp, I felt fine physically, but when it came time to sleep at night, I couldn’t for very long. I don’t know what I was nervous about. It was always just there in the back of my mind, making me feel uneasy.”

Christine woke up hours before the group did, playing solitaire and listening to Oh Wonder’s “Technicolour Beat,” a hypnotic song to calm her racing mind. “Pole, pole.”

Days 3–6: Heath, moorlands and alpine desert. As they climbed through the clouds, rain beating down, the trek grew increasingly difficult. Christine became even more nervous as the group climbed to higher and higher altitudes. If anything were to happen to her, it would take a long time for paramedics to reach the group.

During the climb Christine carried a working compass, which she wore in her hip pocket (a gift from me). Around her neck, she donned a star necklace reminding her to “follow her dreams,” a gift from her mother. These personal items may not have helped with the actual climbing, but they did help keep her motivated and was a reminder that her friends and family from back home were cheering her on toward success.

The Barranco Wall proved to be the most exciting part of the mountain. Ridding themselves of their trekking poles for just a few hours, the group climbed the rocky barrier in order to reach camp that night. As an avid rock climber, Christine loved the challenge the rock wall provided her. She was able to climb without the use of ropes, a technique known as bouldering.

“Some days were really hard. I would get impatient at how slow we were going. I really started focusing on doing small tasks and staying calm. Just wake-up and get ready. Just eat breakfast. Wait calmly until climbing. Put one foot in front of the other. Calm down after hiking. Eat dinner. I just thought about accomplishing my goals, not about the future. I focused on right now,“pole, pole.”’

“I had to keep my mind busy as we climbed. I even sang, ‘Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’ at one point because my backpack was making my head, neck and shoulders ache so much. If I decided to stop walking, it would be a long way back down. The only way to go was up.”

Six long days of hiking in high altitudes passed. Members of the group started complaining of minor health problems but Christine was still feeling fine. Serifin would come into the tent every morning with an oxygen/heart rate monitor and track each climber’s oxygen levels. Christine hovered around 97 percent during the climb, the highest of the group. Her body was adjusting just fine.

Sometimes being brave is simply surviving, moving from one task to the next and not giving up. At the time, it may not feel like bravery, but in a place where nothing is familiar, what more can you expect from yourself? Learning to exist miles outside your comfort zone can take lots of reassurance. Usually we look to our support team of friends and family to help us in tough times like this, but what about when we are walking among strangers? Sometimes all the reassurance you need is knowing that you are putting one foot in front of the other; that you are moving. “Pole, pole.”

Check out Part 3 here: https://medium.com/@alexis_lav5/part-3-the-hardest-day-of-my-whole-life-summit-day-29c859cb0da0#.ag8nkgnes

This story isn’t actually mine to tell, it’s my friend Christine’s story. After she completed her climb, she told me she felt she could do anything now. Sometimes the things that put us so far outside our comfort zone are the things that help us put the rest of our life into perspective.

Christine has always been an adventurous dare-devil who loves the outdoors. She hikes, rock climbs, and travels like nobody’s business. Ever since we were in middle school, her dream has been to travel the world. If you tell her the world’s largest free-standing mountain happens to be on the same continent she is studying abroad on, then of course she has to climb it! All while traveling solo, of course.

Since most people do not have vast amounts of knowledge on the world’s mountains, let me start off by saying Mt. Kilimanjaro is the tallest mountain on the African continent and the highest free-standing mountain in the world.

A very quick Google search will tell you that it has three volcanic cones, one of which is dormant but could erupt again. Almost every kind of ecological system is found on this mountain: cultivated land, rain forest, heath, moorland, alpine desert and arctic at the summit (the highest peak).

But let’s start at the beginning of Christine’s trip, before the climb even began. Her flight landed in Nairobi, Kenya and she had some time to explore the city before her bus to Kilimanjaro.

“I stayed at the Summit Safari Lodge and saw rabbits hopping in the yard. When I went to dinner, I realized the hotel was empty. I had taken my altitude medicine right before dinner and the combination of nerves, nausea and dizziness killed my appetite.”

After dinner, Christine’s symptoms were growing worse. She started panicking, knowing that she had to climb tomorrow. She couldn’t be sick at the start. She decided to ask someone at the hotel if they knew a doctor she could talk to.

“They said I could go to the hospital, so I did. At this point it was 11:00 p.m. and the taxi ride there was taking forever. When I finally got to hospital, the taxi driver took me inside. I wasn’t asked for an insurance card but told to provide my name, birthday and tribe, obviously I couldn’t answer that last question. Immediately I was told I had to pay in cash and was sent back out in the taxi to find a cash machine. I had just thrown up.”

“A thunderstorm was raging outside and the banks ended up being closed. I was crying so hard at this point. The cab driver was saying, ‘Sister, sister,why are you crying?’ ”

The driver eventually found an open cash machine. Christine had no idea how much money she even needed to pay for her visit, hoping she was withdrawing enough. When she finally returned to the hospital it was very late and the staff all looked half asleep. Her doctor said they would have to take a full blood picture, or what we know as a blood test.

While she was receiving her travel immunizations in America, the nurse had told her not to get any tattoos or use any needles because of the risk of disease. Christine was debating whether or not she should give blood, but ultimately decided to. After the blood was drawn, she felt even dizzier. She asked the nurse for a cup of water but was told there wasn’t any clean water in the hospital.

“The doctor ended up giving me one of his bottled waters. He said the results turned out fine, but that I shouldn’t take any more of the altitude medicine since it appeared I was having a strong reaction to it.”

“I had been crying ever since I got in the taxi.The doctor finally asked me what was wrong. I told him I was so anxious for my climb and I felt so sick. He said, ‘Being alone is a sickness. All you have is your thoughts to make you nervous. Go back to your hotel and watch a movie to help quiet your mind.’ ”

Christine returned to the taxi feeling much calmer. Thunder was still booming as they drove on the narrow dirt road, feral dogs barking at the car, heading back to the lodge. When she returned to her room, she played her favorite movie on her iPad to distract herself, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, as per the doctor’s orders.

“Having barely slept, I woke at 7:40 a.m. to take the bus to Kilimanjaro. I completely did not want to do this anymore. I ended up calling my mom. I told her I would rather sit in this hotel for 8 days then climb that mountain. She managed to calm me down and before I knew it I was packing my things and heading to the bus.”

After everything that had just happened, day 1 was starting. Sometimes the worrying that comes before a big event is the hardest part. The fears we have can be scarier than the actual event itself. When you are forced to face a fear alone, your brain runs wild with possibilities. The best way to calm our minds is to be reassured by those who support us.

Ultimately, Christine was able to turn to her support system and start her climb. The circumstances with which the hiked began were not ideal, but there never is a perfect time to begin something. Sometimes we have to be willing to make a leap, even when all of the odds feel stacked against us.

Check out part 2 of the story here: https://medium.com/@alexis_lav5/part-2-are-we-out-of-the-woods-yet-a19967df4445#.epvokr3ic

Sometimes we have trouble making decisions: what job to choose, where to live or even just how to handle a situation. Often we make these decisions based on our moral compasses, but we don’t always know what we stand for. That is where a personal mission statement comes in…

Businesses have mission statements because they need to understand why they are doing what they are doing. A company needs to be motivated in the work that they do. And so do you.

You need to have a mission statement for your life, but how do you create one? By learning the basic structure businesses use. There are three main components to every mission statement:

• Target audience
• Material to be delivered
• Expected outcome for your audience

Take a look at Nike’s. The target audience is athletes (anyone with a body), material to be delivered is innovation and expected outcome for the audience is innovation.

What about your own personal mission statement? Why do you live your life? Keep in mind you are the target audience and you determine the actions you will take in order to create the outcome you want in your life.

A mission statement can and should be simple, don’t over-complicate it. Take Walt Disney’s for example:

Oprah’s is “to be a teacher. And to be known for inspiring my students to be more than they thought they could be.”

Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group’s is “to have fun in [my] journey through life and learn from [my] mistakes.”

Or my personal favorite, Maya Angelou’s:

The point is, there is no right or wrong to your personal mission statement, the why to your life is uniquely yours. Think about what you care about, think about the change you want to see in the world and how you can create it. What are your talents? How can those be used?

So go on and write down your mission statement! Act according to your core beliefs at all times and you won’t make decisions you regret. Don’t you want to understand who you are and what you stand for?

Here’s a little inspiration for you, my very own mission statement:

“To help people, by exploring and discovering the world and sharing with others the ideas and stories that have inspired me.”

-Alexis-

This weekend I had the pleasure of performing in a show which chronicled the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). The show “Most Dangerous Women” was something I was proud to be a part of. I enjoyed learning about the achievements of each of the women and what they had done to help the world since the beginning of WWI.

Little did I realize that much of the cast, as well as many of the audience members, found the play to be “too feminist.” I couldn’t understand it. What did they even mean by that? Because we were telling the story of women taking charge, exerting their power to produce change, suddenly people were uncomfortable?

It’s the same argument people have been having for years: feminism is “man-bashing” instead of equality of the sexes. I think people feel this way because in order to create equality, the injustices in society first need to be exposed. Just as they do when addressing issues like racism or homophobia.

The purpose of exposing injustices is not to bash the people who currently possess the most power, in this case men, but instead to acknowledge that yes men do have the most power but let’s work to distribute that power among women too.

I really appreciate the work of the WILPF women. When you think of all they accomplished, with the concept of feminism being so hard to digest in 2016, the idea of fighting for it in 1915 seems nearly impossible.

Why Does Feminism Make People Uncomfortable? was originally published in Athena Talks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I have always been a creative soul, enjoying singing and acting on the stage in high school. As I went to college, I tried to veer away from my creative side and focus on the practical: business. I found that while I enjoyed my studies, I also felt that something was missing from my life.

I had never tried my hand at drawing before, I had always assumed that if you were any good at art you would just sort of know. It had never occurred to me that the artsy people I watched sketching buildings in the park weren’t always that good. They had to practice. Just like anything else.

Now I am not going to pretend that I am Picasso, because I am not. But throughout the years I have found that practicing art has been important for me. By allowing my hands to sketch and color as my mind wandered, I was letting my brain rest for an hour. I found myself sketching during finals, sketching whenever something upset me and sketching when I was perfectly happy. I guess it was becoming my own personal drug.

Drawing not only allowed me to relax and express myself creatively, but it also gave me something to be proud of. As I created drawings for my friends or hung my artwork on our bare apartment walls, I found myself engaging in conversations about my work with anyone visiting in my apartment. The artwork was bringing us together.

I started to appreciate not being busy every second of the day. I was content to just wander around the city, enjoying the people and the scenes around me. Art taught me to notice the colors, the textures, the little details I had missed before.

I started to appreciate who and what was around me. I started to realize how important creating was. Creating wasn’t just for the select few whose work was being displayed in museums, anyone could do it. Creating is the one thing that is purely human: artists, musicians and architects all show us the best and the worst of human kind.

I am glad I decided to start drawing and I think more people should try. Society tells us that we shouldn’t pursue things we aren’t good at, but why not? If we like to draw or sing then who are we hurting by not being good at it? No one. The worst that could happen is that you passed some time and you probably felt a little less stressed than when you began.

So don’t be afraid to create! Who knows? You might find you are actually pretty good at it. Or you can always rip it up and use it for hamster bedding

-Alexis-

Ever since middle school I have carried a JanSport backpack. Sure I tried out purses and other brands from time to time, but those would just fall apart in a matter of months. After having my current teal JanSport backpack for 6 years, without a sign that it was even beginning to fall apart, I realized that these cheap backpacks found in just about every well-known store had a reason for being so popular.

JanSport backpacks last. They last even when you pile every textbook you own inside of them and spill the contents of your lunch on the interior daily. But why is it that Jansport is so popular? Let’s dissect the company for a moment, shall we?

What does Jansport do? It manufactures backpacks. By staying focused on one product, the company is able to produce high-quality backpacks.

Why does Jansport do what it does? It wants to assist people on their adventures! By making a quality backpack that lasts, the company can ensure that you have a way to travel while carrying all the items you need.

As a student, I can proudly say that my aging Jansport has assisted me on many of my adventures. When I first came to college, my backpack kept me company on my first day of classes. As I learned the new city I was living in my backpack learned with me, following me on long walks, snacking at picnics and working on numerous jobs.

As I traveled to Minnesota, Indiana, New Orleans, California and Illinois over my college years, my backpack assisted me as a free carry-on. It traveled home with me on long train rides during the weekends and it sat with me during long rehearsals for countless shows.

It received a lot of ware and tear but I cleaned off the stains and kept on using it. It’s funny, I can’t imagine going on any adventure without it. I know it will continue to last for years to come and I am glad to know how special it has become to me. And thus I have just proved that Jansport’s mission has been accomplished!

Clearly there is a divide between what millennials think of themselves and what HR Professionals think. As a millennial, I tend to agree with all of things listed above:

I am not as tech-savvy as adults think I am. There is too much technology out there right now to even begin to understand how it all works. As an intern, I have found myself thrown at any type of new technology in hopes that I can figure it out. I am just as scared of it as they are!

Hard working? Hell yeah. I go to school, intern, work on campus and participate heavily in theater productions. Of course I work hard and so do my roommates; we hardly ever see each other during the week. My mom told me she never had to work during school. She also told me she never had an internship. And oh yeah, she just found a job right out of college.

Loyal to my job… I would love to stay on at the internships I have held and keep working to make those businesses better, but guess what? Those companies don’t want to keep you. They assume by the time the semester is up, interns will just leave and a fresh batch of unpaid labor will come in.

Why else would we be doing all of this labor for free? We could be working and making money at our unprofessional jobs but we work for your company because we hope to get a job there. It might as well be a new round of slave labor to have interns do all of the grunt work for a business and find no reward. Putting the menials tasks we do at internships on a resume doesn’t help us find jobs in the future, we aren’t building job skills the way we are promised. Why millennials flit back and forth from job to job might not be because we want to, but because the current job market demands it.

So why are there so many misconceptions about millennials? Marketers and HR people alike try to understand the younger generation of workers but there is this large divide. Is it the same divide that was present when our parents went to work? And when our grandparents went to work? Young people want to have fun, can’t commit to anything and want everything for free. Is that just a common stereotype? Or is this conception unique to our generation?

Either way, millennials need to understand how employers view them and use these misconceptions to their advantage. If employers think that young people have all of the technology skills their company needs, then play into it and learn on the go.

Unfortunately the other misconceptions of millennials* are harder to use to your advantage. The negative stereotypes employers have of millennials can only be righted through hard work. Stick with a company you are passionate about and communicate with the people who work there about who you really are. It is up to us to change the perceptions that HR Professionals have about millennials.

So keep working hard. Keep interning. And one day you will be the one doing the hiring, probably judging the next generation in much the same way.

*And can we all agree that the term millennial is kind of annoying? It has almost become synonymous with lazy, self-centered youth.

The Diederich College of Communications hosted its 4th annual Digital Summit as a part of Marquette’s Insight Summit Series. The proceeds from the event went towards scholarships for students pursuing Communications. Natasha Mraz, a Public Relations major and Digital Media minor, was one of the three coordinators for the event.

Q: Can you walk me through the planning process for an event like the summit?

A: The event took place on Feb. 25 but the process started all the way back in April, following last year’s summit. By October, we started meeting every two weeks to check in on our progress. Starting in January the meetings switched to weekly occurrences; communication among members grew constant.

We partnered with advertising agency Laughlin Constable and were able to reach out to their contact, namely clients, to find speakers for our event. We wanted to branch out from the summit’s usual advertising focus and instead look at relevant case studies, trends and actionable data.

We tried our hardest to ensure the lineup of speakers was diverse, both in race and gender. This time, we especially wanted to contact more women to speak for our summit. Oftentimes with events such as the summit, you find heterosexual, white men to be the majority of the speakers representing a company. We wanted to represent all types of people and diverse viewpoints.

Some important questions I made sure to ask myself were: Why are we doing this summit? How will this summit be important to the students? Why are these speakers coming to Marquette; how are they helpful to our community?

Gee Ekachai on Twitter

17 speakers, 1 Digital Summit. 1 day to go. We're ready! @MUDigitalSummit @MUCollegeofComm #muiss pic.twitter.com/2pA7Aewol1

The day before the summit we hosted three professional workshops. Coordinating our efforts with the Alumni Memorial Center (AMU) was especially important because we were using their ballrooms for the event. We hosted an after-party at the Annex for workshop attendees to network after the event.

Rebecca Streightiff on Twitter

The best way to end the @MUDigitalSummit? HAPPY HOUR! #MUISS pic.twitter.com/nJvFOvTOQN

Q: Much of the communication that took place during the summit happened on twitter, how was it a useful resource during this process?

A: Our main platform was twitter because it was so much easier to release condensed information. Attendees used twitter to share quotes from speakers in real time. Hashtags were especially helpful because the summit wasn’t an especially visual event.We wanted people to tweet during speaker presentations to provide valuable research and create publicity for each presentation.

Bridget Cirone on Twitter

As a millennial who loves having a playlist for everything I relate to @Spotify's theory that we look for the soundtrack to our life #MUISS

We created infographics for our guests speakers after discovering tweets with a photo or graphic saw more visibility and retweets than those without. Because Microsoft, Google and Spotify provided our biggest speakers, we used hashtags to incorporate their brands,“hangout with #google.”

I don’t agree with people who think twitter is dead. Twitter is the easiest social media platform to connect with businesses and professionals. I agree that personal twitters are becoming less rare, but every serious brand benefits from being active on twitter. Big events such as the Oscars or the Superbowl thrive off of twitter’s platform.

When uploading large amounts of content, Facebook isn’t especially helpful; posts can get lost in a news feed and never seen again. On Instagram, uploading more than one picture in a row is seen as a taboo. Twitter is meant for constant updates.

Laughlin Constable on Twitter

11 ways to humanize your brand. #MUISS pic.twitter.com/NcW1QNifmy

Q: How did student ambassadors help contribute to the summit’s success?

A: I wanted the ambassadors to not just work the event during the big day, but to also be involved in the planning process. Each ambassador was assigned one speaker to work with leading up to the summit, as well as to assist and shadow on the actual day. Students utilized twitter to communicate and promote their individual speaker. Working one-on-one with the speakers was a great opportunity for the students to network and connect.

Gee Ekachai on Twitter

Want to give a shout out to our awesome @MUDigitalSummit student ambassadors. Thx for all your help today. #muiss pic.twitter.com/nfvCtXpHuU

We wanted to keep our ambassadors as diverse as our speakers, so we chose students from each class. One of the perks of being an ambassador to this event was the free admission. The ambassador program used to purely exist as a liaison function, but now the role incorporates social media as a major component.

MU Digital Summit on Twitter

Final #StudentAmbassador meeting = Ready for the brilliant #MUISS speaker lineup = pic.twitter.com/penN5SJEVG

Q: What parts of the event did you coordinate specifically?

A: I helped design the graphics, such as the posters and handouts. I was also the ambassador supervisor, managing the team of students. Some other aspects of the event I worked on included transportation, lodging and speaker-agreement forms.

Q: What effect did the many hours of planning have on your personal life? How did you balance the two?

A: I find that I am often over-committing myself to different responsibilities. As the event coordinator for the Meladies, the all-female A Capella group at Marquette, I definitely felt the stress of trying to stay on top of everything. I always prioritize my group work first and my personal school work second. You can’t be messaging people at three in the morning but you can always stay up that late to do work by yourself.

I tried to respond as quickly as possible to the speakers and students with all of the information I could give them at that time. I have found it is always better to over-communicate rather than provide a vague statement. I would always rather be transparent and overshare.

It was hard to stay present in my classes when I was constantly responding to all different people’s needs. Professionals get so many emails, so I would always try and send a follow-up text as a reminder and also to summarize the main points of my email. By making it easier for other people to get their work done, I knew it would make it easier for my work to get done too.

Staying organized from the beginning saved me during this process. I had an excel sheet for each ambassador and their client. I was always trying to stay available for whoever needed me, as best I could. Instead of bugging people with stupid questions, I tried to find the answers out on my own.

To make this process easier for next year, I think assigning a third student to the committee would be really helpful. I really hope to see the ambassador program continue to grow and empower the the student ambassadors to take charge.

It would be really awesome if the summit could evolve from a one-day event to a week-long event. I hope the number of students attending the event continues to grow because the College of Communications is just as good as the more well-known Nursing and Engineering colleges.

Marquette Today on Twitter

Welcome to nearly 500 attendees of the #MUISS Digital Summit! pic.twitter.com/cBnMApm5w0

_Alexis_

Trust noun \ˈtrəst\

Belief that someone or something is reliable, good, honest, effective, etc.

What does it mean to trust someone? We are taught early in life that the world is full of good and bad people. Stranger danger teaches little kids that there are people in the world that want to hurt them, take them. But despite this, we still let our guard down because it’s human nature to find trust in one another. We end up letting someone in, and suddenly the unsteady glacier of life’s uncertainties tips, and only the strong survive.

I had a fairly happy childhood. I fell upon difficult times when my mother passed when I was seven. I became a motherless child, with no siblings, and a father who was thrown into a world of uncertainties: a world of being a single father. It was around this seemingly ceaseless, agonizing time when Whitney came into my life. She moved next door to us in my humdrum of a hometown, Ely, Indiana. I still richly remember the first time I met her. It was a hot and sticky summer in 1999. I was outside, lazily playing with a ball to create some sort of fun, as much as solitary seven-year-old could. Then I saw her family’s old station wagon pull into her driveway. When she appeared from the car, I saw that she was covered in dirt, dressed in light blue overall shorts with one undone strap, and a yellow shirt underneath that was beginning to become untucked. She looked disheveled. She had a head of curly, dirty blonde hair that went every which way, and a face full of freckles. My ball had rolled over to her yard. With a smile, Whitney promptly picked up the ball and handed it to me. I looked to say thank you, and as I sheepishly met her gaze; I was faced with the palest blue eyes I had ever seen. At this age, I could only compare the hue of her irises to little oceans, as I had been on a trip once with my dad to South Carolina a few months prior. But even in our youth I could see her expression was faintly clouded with a slight darkness or sadness despite her bright personality. She saw that I was alone, and she asked I would mind if she joined me. That simple, innocent exchange of words and smiles was how our friendship began. It wasn’t until a few days later that I actually learned her name. Being from a small town, I thought Whitney was the coolest name I had ever heard at my age. She was nine years old, only two years older than me. She and her dad moved to Ely after her mom had run off with another man. She never really spoke much about it. She was just like me: motherless, however, she had an older sister, Ashley. Not only were Whitney and I inseparable, but our fathers began to become good friends as well. There weren’t many single fathers raising daughters in Ely. Whitney was my role model, my idol. She was the one I looked to for advice, the person I always strived to impress, and whose opinion seemed more important than anyone else’s. She was around my age, she knew loss like I did, she felt that absence just like me, and she understood me. I continuously followed her around in the attempt to try to do everything she did. In some ways, I think she took advantage of my noticeable need for her. But then other times, I wonder if she ever knew how important and influential she was to me.

Love noun \ˈləv\

A feeling of strong or constant affection for a person

I believe that love is the worst emotion that was ever created. It’s as if it was created by the gods for their personal pleasure, as they watched the naïve humans struggle to comprehend it. There is nothing more in the world that can bring humans more together, but also tear them more apart. Many wars have been started because of people taking their love, their obsession too far. Even the bible teaches love. Romans 12:10 says “be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.” Not only do I not understand love, I hate it. It’s one of the strongest emotions in the world, and it’s the one that leaves you the most devastated and broken afterwards. My love for Whitney was purely sisterly. We did everything together growing up. Sometimes it was even hard to remember that we weren’t actually sisters. Not to say that we never fought, we fought like sisters too. Over anything, and sometimes, it seemed like everything. But the longest fight we ever had lasted for two hours. We always forgave and forgot quickly. Today, I still find myself really missing the times we used to play outside.

We grew older. Whitney slowly began to change once we got into high school. At first, it was little things: she dyed her hair, wore different makeup, and then began to change how she dressed. I knew that everyone changed when they got to high school. She began ignoring me, acting out at home, always fighting with her dad, and sneaking out to meet her boyfriend late at night. It wasn’t until I heard rumors of her doing hard drugs that I had to step in after standing on the side for so long. This was the last time I ever spoke to her while she was alive, and I will remember this conversation until I die.

“Whitney, what’s been up with you? I never see you anymore… What happened to us?” I was sitting on her unkempt bed while she hastily got ready to go to some party that I would never feel comfortable enough to attend.

“NOTHING. Nothing has changed, Angela. Stop being so over dramatic; you’re acting just like my dad. God.” She replied without even looking at me. One punch to the stomach. Was I really not worth her time? A part of me felt like this was because she just couldn’t get herself to look at me. I could feel the guilt radiating off of her. But devil’s advocate on my shoulder told me otherwise, she just didn’t care about me anymore.

I hesitated with the next part, afraid of what she might say or how she could react.

“Whitney, I heard rumors of you doing drugs, are they true? Don’t tell me this is true.”

The look she gave me was chilling. Her eyes were hard and narrow. Lifeless. Her cheeks were puckered and hollow as if she had eaten something sour, and her lips were drawn up into a line. I had never seen her look like this before, for a brief second I didn’t even recognize her. Where was my happy friend? Who was this monster that replaced her? Two more punches to the stomach. I could feel the tears pooling in my eyes, and my jaw began to tighten to hold them back. Had I really meant nothing to her for her to so blatantly disregard my feelings regarding our friendship? How could she not feel disappointment I had that my hero was letting her life slip out of her control?

“What I do with my life is none of your fucking business. We were friends when we were little. Face it, Angie, I’ve changed and grown up, and you haven’t. It’s time for you to move on, and get over your uppity, self-righteous self. You can’t save me. I don’t need you. You’re nothing”, Whitney scolded.

Another punch. I was unable to mutter a word; I was stunned. Everything that we had gone through and all the memories we shared actually meant nothing to her. Our friendship was fleeting and I hadn’t ever realized it. Was I a fool for being so naïve? I felt myself falling, my mind was frantic, my body was trying to grab ahold of anything, everything. My breathing was sharp, the tears were getting harder to hold back. My eyes burned. This must be the feeling of reality being pulled out from under you.

“Ok.” I said. “I’ll just leave.”

With that, I got up and started to walk out. As I started moving toward the door, I realized I was moving farther away from our dwindling friendship, but I knew it would be near impossible to repair. Maybe this would be the last time I saw her bedroom. Maybe it was the last time we would ever talk. In the end I was right. I finally looked back one more time to see her eyes glowering behind me, filled with tears, betrayal, and longing. What did she want me to do? Why was she doing this to me? She quickly looked down, and said nothing more. I left.

Grief noun \ˈgrēf\

A deep sadness or suffering especially caused by someone’s death

What does it mean to grieve? It’s a natural part of human coping, and most people say it’s just a deep sadness that only time can heal. Well, all those people that say that can go fuck themselves. I am no stranger to grief; I’m just an old returning friend of it. “Oh, don’t worry. Everything will get better”, they say, “just keep your head up and look to the future.” Well sometimes you are in a place so dark that you get stuck in the dark corners of your mind and can’t seem to find the future. Sometimes life just piles on in such large, incessant quantities, that your shoulders begin to hunch, your breathing shallows, and every fabricated smile is forced, because otherwise it would be tears. Grief is not simply a deep sadness; for me, it’s the feeling that there is a blossoming burden to live. It’s the pain to be expected to carry on life when all you want to do is walk into your bedroom on a Tuesday, curl up into a ball, sit in silence, and cry until there’s nothing left. Grief is when you want to hurl things at the wall, screaming at the top of your lungs because this godforsaken place called Earth has just become your own personal hell. Grief is not natural.

She committed suicide two days after I walked out of her bedroom that night.

My whole life shattered.

Have you ever felt so sad that it physically hurt to breathe? I felt like I was suffocating, gasping for air and never getting any into my heaving lungs. It seemed like I was perpetually drowning in my own sadness, unknowing as to when or if I could ever feel like my old self again. I vividly remember first seeing the flashing blue and red of the ambulance, confused, thinking maybe it was for our elderly neighbor. I can’t decide which memory I saw more clearly: was it the nine-year old Whitney smiling at me on that day in 1999, or was it the sight of an ambulance pulling up with paramedics bursting out with a gurney to take away my best friend? The longer I stared, the more fear washed over me, and somewhere in the back of my mind I knew it was for her. My throat tightened, and my jaw clenched again. I felt that same feeling of getting punched in the stomach as I did when I last spoke to her. I remember running outside and stopping on the sidewalk, falling to the pavement as I watched them roll her body out of her house. The neighborhood was frantic, the lights flashing, the reoccurring CPR, again and again, the shouting of her dad begging his daughter to live. I watched them from the ground attempting to revive her, over and over, failing each time, before finally connecting her to tubes inside the ambulance. They sped away. But I knew it was too late. It all happened in an instant, but is never-ending in my mind.

I visited her once in the hospital. Once was too many times. She was attached to pretty much every machine possible to keep her alive. Her skin color was off, her face was clear of makeup, and her hands were rough and wet with sweat. Her breathing was irregular; I could hear the sound of the machine filling her lungs with air, and then collapsing, and then filling and collapsing. It was a haunting scene. With one look I knew she was never going to wake up. Yet even with this feeling, I didn’t say all that I wished I had. I was still grasping onto some fleeting strand of hope that she would wake up. The doctors said that sometimes certain people talking can help bring people out of comas. I was sure that if I talked to her, it would work. Essentially, I saw my best friend pass away in front of me. Not on the actual day, but I saw her spirit withering away, and I noticed signs of her unhappiness. I could have tried harder to save her or to understand her much like she had understood me throughout our childhood. Instead of reacting to her tears, her silent pleas of help, I walked away. Now it was time to walk away again.

She died two weeks later.

Sometimes I wonder, had I begged her to live, would she have awakened? The weeks following her death were a blur. There was no note found, no reason as to why she did this to herself and to all of us who loved her. All of us who still love her. At first, no one dared to ask why, but as time went on, for some reason, people thought I would have the answer. Simply put I wish I did, but I didn’t. I felt ashamed that I didn’t, my ignorance to her unhappiness revealed our failed friendship. I had failed her as a friend and as a human being. I wish I were there for her when she needed me the most. Maybe she was right. Maybe I was too naïve and self-righteous, and that’s why I didn’t delve deeper into her thoughts when I had the chance. I wish I had stayed that night in her bedroom when she obviously needed me. I have a lot of wishes, and a lot of what ifs. It’s hard to lead a life that way.

Suicide is not like dying from cancer, or a car accident, or anything else where the cause of death is known or accepted. There’s not usually a final goodbye or acceptance of limited time. I will never know exactly what pushed her to her limit, and I will never be able to pass it. Sometimes I still visit her house to sit in silence with her dad in the kitchen. I know he goes through the same scenarios of helping her as I do. But the fact of the matter is that I can’t go back in time; I can’t change what happened. But I wish I could. She was my best friend, and I loved her. But like when we were little kids, she failed to recognize that, and she consequentially couldn’t find it within herself to love herself. She couldn’t fully give herself to others. I wish the world could have seen how great she would have been.

Love noun \ˈləv\

“Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get — only with what you are expecting to give — which is everything.” (Katharine Hepburn)

My friend wrote this wonderful story, this is only the rough draft, but I thought it needed to be shared and read. Isn’t she so talented? Love you Crystal.

_Alexis_