One of the best things about working in education is the inspiration you can find in your students.
For the last two years, I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Connor, a journalism student and probably the only person left on campus who can deftly chat America East men’s basketball. He visited my doorway on Friday, as he and other students often do. I don’t have a big enough office for meetings, so standing or sitting in my doorway to chat has become a tradition among students who I advise or who just want to chat. (A group of them even created a Facebook group called, “Kat’s Doorway Society” back in 2008.)
While he was in my doorway last Friday, Connor mentioned he’s been blogging every single day for 14 consecutive months. I was floored. How could this overbooked college student (he works multiple jobs on campus, PA announces basketball games, takes a full-course load, has friends, and is involved) have this amazing writing streak going? The answer: he just does it. No excuses.
So I told him right then and there that I was going to see if I could do it for a month straight. I may work multiple jobs and am putting a lot of energy into a personal situation, but that’s no excuse. If Connor can do it, I can do it.
The other part of taking on the challenge was to get myself back in the groove of writing for myself. I’ve fallen into a rut where I’ve found myself only writing what’s been assigned to me, which usually is a game or meet story. The danger of that rut? My part-time sports writing career isn’t going to last forever. I’ve already had to make some big cuts to my writing gigs this year, and I can’t pretend that my full-time job schedule will allow me to write for others forever. Because of this, I have to renew my ability to come up with my own ideas and be self-motivated to write.
Let’s see if I can do this. A post a day for one month, no matter what happens.