Uneasiness

So I want to be a broadcast journalist. It's been my chosen career since I was 5 years old. Seriously. I was in kindergarten watching the Challenger space shuttle lift off. Remember how it was a big deal because there was a teacher on board? Anyway, the thing exploded, the news media went nuts, and I found my calling. That's the short story. So I've gone to school, did some internships, traveled a little, and now I'm ready to start. I've put my resume tape together and I've sent it out to about 40 places across the country. Last Friday I get two callbacks. One from a station in Bismarck, North Dakota and another from a station in Wichita Falls, Texas. Now before you all start snickering wildly you have to understand something about the news business. It's extremely competitive. The vast majority of people have to start out at a small news station in a small town in a corner of a state that most people would never want to go to. It's how we journalists pay our dues. I'm willing to spend two years in Wichita Falls if it means I can be the next Tom Brokaw. But I'm still in the waiting game. Neither station actually offered me anything. They both said I was in the running for reporter/anchor positions, they liked my tape, and they had more to go through. But they said they'd call me back. So that's why I'm uneasy. I want them to call me now. I want to start planning things. I'm so damn impatient.

Signing on

Hmm. Okay I've done it. I've officially started a blog. I've resisted for so long. The reason? I love the idea of having my thoughts out there for all the world to see. But deep down I question my ability as a writer and I figure any blog I create is doomed to failure. But I'm forging ahead. I have an ulterior motive though. I am a journalist at heart. And hopefully I'll be a journalist in practice very soon. As someone who has been obsessed with television journalism for 20 years now and as someone who is in the initial stages of launching his own career, I figure a blog would be one little slice of my total journalistic contribution to the world. Never mind the fact that I'm more likely to write about the strange dinner I had at Olive Garden rather than the latest hurricane headed for Florida. Besides...wouldn't you rather hear Tom Brokaw describe how he loves Chocolate Lasagna? Who cares what he has to say about Israel? So that's my motivation for starting my very own blog.

And I'm a little jealous of all the attention Kathryn is getting. :)

Linco