When getting asked to write this farewell, I thought of the phrase “saying goodbye is just another way of saying see you later.” So see you later, Wildcats, it was great to serve you and write about this school with every ounce of pride and spirit, added with bringing entertainment to the feeds of everyone who watches. The Wildcat Tales was never just a class for me. Throughout my high school experience, I tried a lot of things to understand what and who I wanted to be. I thought for the longest that I wanted to be in a stiff box office studying the changes in profit for a business, or some kind of assistant for someone way more important than me. I didn’t know who I was, and I definitely didn’t want to be anyone that everyone would pay attention to.
I always loved writing. Putting words to paper, or Google Docs, and having someone read it and understand my exact thoughts without me having to speak them was a feeling that I always felt joy in having. And I guess I could’ve been an author, but my writer’s block always cut sentences too short on the page, and my unwillingness to plan made the stories twisted into ties I couldn’t undo. I could’ve been a poet, but my inability to understand, better yet write very obvious details coated in figurative language, made that dream very hard to even imagine. So I settled on Business. The default. Now I know many people out there who love the world of business and the excitement of sitting in a cubicle all day analyzing graphs about a booming business, but me, I could never get into that life. I would nervously answer ‘business ‘when asked what major I was choosing, yet I was so unsure of what I wanted to do that I chose the easy option. And within all of the confusion and anger, not understanding what career path to choose, I sought help. I’d ask my classmates what career they would see fit, or if I could do any job, what would it be? And I never really liked their answers; I got told a doctor, a lawyer, and one time I got recommended to be a teacher. One day in the winter of my sophomore year, when picking my junior year schedule, I was looking for a filler elective. I chose the obvious AVID and my favorite dance, and since I always loved writing, I wanted to take a writing-focused class.Reading out the list,I got to ‘journalism’. I look over, and my good friend says to me, “You would be a great journalist. You talk a lot.” When being told that, of course, I was a little stricken at the fact that I talk too much or something of the sort, but when she explained to me what it was, I was interested. So, I signed up for the class and met one of the most influential teachers in my 12-year career as a student: Mr. Dumois. My journalism class taught me substantial amounts of information and kept me on my toes with writing skills that I could apply to my English 3 class. Most importantly, journalism made me feel like it was my home, where I was meant to be.
For the first time in my life, I had never felt so sure of what I wanted for myself, so of course, I had to move on to the second stage: newspaper. The newspaper class was different in all the ways that it possibly could be. Firstly, when I found out I would be writing articles on any material I wanted for others to see, I was thrilled. I felt like if I really wanted to someday write for a paper or publication, this is the experience I needed. Secondly, I went from a class of twenty to a class of 2. The number change was different, yet I feel like we benefited from it and benefited from it at the same time. We only had a number of writers at the time, so it would get pretty hectic, but at the same time, the lack of editors and writers made the learning process more intimate, with Mr. D easily giving quick feedback and not having to wait for a line of other curious students to ask about their articles. The newspaper also offered many opportunities for me, where I learned what I truly wanted to do in the world of Journalism. One day, we got the idea that, hey, maybe we should get videos out there. Whether it was the morning news videos where we sat at a desk reading off a teleprompter and trying to get the many takes right, or my personal favorite, interviews where we’d roam the halls and ask random questions to whoever wanted to participate.
From these experiences, I learned that I would love to get into the Sports Broadcast and multimedia area in journalism after endless times of writing about the football team or reading off the script about the Cowboys. It was what I wanted to do. Finally, I owe this success to the newspaper staff. Luca, Bahara, and Mr. D, when you read this, I want to say thank you. I don’t know where we will all end up in the next 5 years, but I do know that I will always be grateful for this beautiful experience of being a staff writer. I had some great days being a Wildcat thanks to this program.
