Beginning and End…What Happened to the Middle?

Apparently keeping up with this blog has not been my strong suit throughout the semester. I told you about the first four weeks and have been silent ever since. So as I’m trying to finish up my last week of school for the rest of my life, the question is…what happened to the middle? Well in all honesty, it’s a big, giant blur.

The End Is Coming

I knew this semester would be a challenge from the start. How could it not be? My last semester of grad school, a full-time job, another part-time job, and a part time internship…that’s enough to cause anyone a little stress. But I’ve always had a tendency to pile on the responsibilities so I figured it wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle. Well…whether I could handle it or not is yet to be determined. It’s not looking good. I’m still waiting for the melodramatic meltdown.

I sat down and made an overly long list of all the things I still have to do in the last four days of the semester. It’s a little unsettling. Four or five shorter assignments, a research paper, a project paper, and another full news package…that’s the condensed version of the list. But this post isn’t about the end, it’s about the middle.

Picking Up Where I Left Off

From the very start of the semester I had tunnel vision on one thing, getting a job. But I knew I couldn’t find a job until I had material to send to potential employers. This encouraged me to do more than just the bare minimum when it came to building my news packages. I wanted and needed stories that looked like they could be on real news.

Turns out those packages were not what was going to get me a job. To be honest I don’t really know what got me a job. WEAR News Channel 3 in Pensacola, Florida will be my new home. I’ll be a producer. During my interview, the news director, Kimberly Wyatt, went through a few of my packages with me very quickly but she didn’t spend a lot of time on them. That could be because she wasn’t evaluating me as a reporter.

I spent an entire day at WEAR the day of my interview. I spoke to several people, worked with a producer for much of the day helping him write stories for his show, and I took a writing test. So I guess she was mostly evaluating me on my writing. But I think what really got me the job was the initiative I took to reach out to the news director and tell her when I wanted to meet and then drove down to meet her.

This isn’t to say I shouldn’t have put so much work into the packages because I’m glad that I did. Building those packages made me confident that I can actually enter the news world and be successful. Plus I think any other potential employer would have put more consideration into my work.

The Middle

In the beginning of March I switched from the content team to the in-house team. Because of this, missing out on the middle of the semester didn’t mean missing out on all that much. I reported sports and weather a few times, anchored a few times and produced a few times. Producing was obviously the most important part of that time since that’s what I’ll be doing for a living. Which I think I’m alright with.

At first I was a little disappointed that I was only getting job interviews for producing instead of reporting but the more I produced the more I realized it was something I could be good at. Maybe my voice and my look isn’t quite ready for the camera but I like to think my writing is strong. And hopefully spending time in a newsroom will give me the extra experience I need to move into the reporting.

Anchoring makes me realize that I really enjoy being on camera. But it also makes me realize that I enjoy writing and being out looking for stories. I don’t want to be an actor. I want to be a journalist. At WEAR, the anchors don’t do anything but read a teleprompter. That don’t write any of their new stories and they don’t go out and make packages. They come in and immediately start reading the scripts for their shows and then they go on camera and read.

My Next Stage In Life

So in four days I am moving to Florida. Everyone keeps telling me how excited I should be and that my life is going to be so great as I start my career and a whole new life. The truth is, I don’t feel that way quite yet. Am I excited? Of course I am. But mostly right now I’m just really scared. I’m scared to leave the town I’ve lived in for 26 years. I’m scared to be away from my family. I’m sad to leave the house that I bought at 23 years old and made my home over the last three years.

And I’m terrified that I’m going to get to Florida and start this job and suck at it.

All of this on top of the stress that I’m experiencing between trying to finish everything I have left for school and getting my house ready to move is kind of suppressing my excitement. How am I going to get all of this done?! But I have to because like it or not, Saturday morning I’m getting in that Uhaul and moving to Florida.

No More Negative…Now The Positive

I’m moving to Florida. FLORIDA. Ten minutes from the beach.

My apartment complex has a pool and a dog park. I’m not going to be a bartender dealing with rude customers. My income won’t depend on how generous or stingy people are feeling that day. Or how busy it is. I’m going to have my dream job. Or at least the beginning stages of it. My job will consist of the things I’ve worked so hard on for the last two years of grad school. For my whole life I’ve had jobs that I practically hated. That life is no more. I’m not just working to pay my bills anymore, I have a career that I want.

Am I scared? Yes. But Friday I’m going to walk across the graduation stage and all the school stress I’ve been feeling will be gone. And then Saturday I’ll be in the truck and all the moving stress will be gone. And I’ll be starting my new life. So maybe I should start listening to everyone when they say I should be excited. Because Saturday starts the first day of the rest of my life. And that’s terrifying. But it’s also pretty darn great.

I’m going to miss a lot of people. But here’s to the next step in life.