A First Time For Everything
On February 22, I got to make a lifelong dream come true — report live on TV. I was lucky enough to get a position with the “Suffolk In the City” program, a partnership between Suffolk University and New England Cable News where students write, film, edit, and report short news stories about life on campus.
The night before, I spent most of the time panicking. What if I made a mistake? What if there were tech issues? What if the piece wasn’t strong enough? What if I had cut too much out for time and missed important details? My interviewees could hate it, the script could be too loose, my makeup might not be professional enough.
And on… and on…
I barely slept, and I spent the southbound drive with my mind racing. It wasn’t until I got there that I started to ground myself in the present and focus on what I needed to do. I broke my tasks down like a HIIT session — recognizing what needed to happen and pushing myself a few short bursts at a time while I listened to the production team both in my earpiece and 6 feet away.
The pivotal moment for me came when I started watching the outside monitors (featuring news stories from around Boston). I knew that the reporters there were doing the same thing I was — waiting and watching as their turns came up. They had production teams working ridiculously hard to bring them to an unseen audiences’ attention, and they’d done their work to put together a story that would benefit the public in one way or another.
So, as I stood there in my coat and Bearpaws, holding a mic (without gloves which, I realize now, was a #RookieMistake), I breathed out all of the doubt that I could and breathed in the knowledge that I’d be done in under 2 minutes, that my story (about Black History Month within Suffolk) mattered, and that even if I did mess up, I’ve made dozens of performance mistakes in the past and I’ve managed to cover 95% of them (a notable exception being when I slammed a door too hard and brought down half the set as I did.)
Everything ended up working out — I connected with two amazing women who could talk about their experiences at Suffolk from different perspectives that still worked well together, I was able to film even without using the school equipment, and I got some quotes that made the story “pop.”
In the end, I did make a flub, but I covered it. I was nervous, but I did it. I owe so much of that day to years of training, both in and out of the classroom, that taught me good instinct, sharp writing, and more.
I got to have a taste of working in the career path I’ve chosen, and, thanks to Skillsoft, it won’t be the only one (more on that soon!).
I have no idea what’s next, but I’m confident it can only go up from here.
