News-reading frenzy

Newspapers were never my friends.
Journalism was like a disease to me.

When I was in the first grade, we had to write a Current Events report due every Friday. It was a simple assignment: look through a newspaper or news magazine to find a story that interests you and summarize the five W's - who, what, where, when, why - in one or two paragraphs. Then hand it in. That's it. Simple, right?

I hated that assignment. I can't remember if I had a hard time figuring out the five W's or if it was boring to me, but I just know I struggled through those assignments. I actually remember getting into a lot of fits with my mom over them. She'd be cooking in the kitchen, and I'd be sitting at the table, flipping through the newspaper, cutting one out and then sprawling all over the chair, whining and complaining about how much I didn't like the news. Or, I'd write one word answers for the five W's like the info on a party invitation and then not show my mom, but then she'd ask to see it and tell me to do it over because Miss Puder wasn't going to accept it unless it was in paragraph form. Either way, I'd probably say 2/3 of the time in the midst of working on the assignment my mom would raise her voice at me and I'd get mad at her, burst out crying, and run downstairs to my dad to comfort me - which he did, every time. And then he'd patiently help me write a check-plus-worthy Current Events report.

Now that I think about it, whatever it was that turned me off from the news probably affected how I've viewed journalism up until recently. I never had any desire to read the newspaper, wasn't one to enjoy reporting facts, hated meeting hard deadlines and had no sense of adventure in trying to "find a story" when I could make up my own rules, write a story you couldn't find anywhere else except in my imagination, and could do it all in my own time on my own terms. That's probably the gist of what I thought of journalism.

But I've seen a slow but big change in my attitude towards journalism over these last few years: I've habitually watched the news with my parents whenever I'm home during a school break, I joined Binghamton's school newspaper, the Pipe Dream (and actually take the time to read it now), and I've made CNN and The New York Times as my internet homepages. But I think those seeds of change have catalyzed their expression particularly within the last few weeks because of my internship.

I thought commuting an hour and half to work and back home would drive me crazy this summer. But as I've discovered, it's a great opportunity to have 20-30 minute chunks of reading time. Sometimes I'll read my current book (which happens to be Get a Financial Life: Personal Financing in your Twenties and Thirties) or usually in the morning I'll read USA Today. Now granted, I wish I could read the whole paper, but a) I don't have enough time on the train/bus to read the whole thing, and b) Pam and I split the paper, so I only take the section that has the crossword puzzle in it :P Usually the crossword puzzle is in the Life Section, but often times (probably strategically done) the crossword puzzle can be found in the Money Section. So if USA Today was trying to get those crossword puzzlers to start reading the Money Section more, they've certainly succeeded with me.

At first I thought it would be a hard read - and yeah, sometimes I don't understand some of the numbers involved in things - but between reading a finance book, picking up on the politics of financial issues from The West Wing, and interning for a life insurance company, I've exponentially picked up on a lot of concepts and terms during this summer so far than I ever could have imagined. And the articles can be really interesting!

Anyway, it's a cool change to see in myself. I used to always be anti-math/finance or anything to do with numbers, but it's cool to see how God is stretching my mind and teaching me tons of things any normal person should be learning in a classroom - but instead I'm learning through the read-and-ask-people-questions method.

And on top of all of this, I'm improving my crossword-solving skills :]