Again, I thought I wanted to write movie reviews, so I ended up giving it a try. I wrote a few during my freshman year. The ones I remember are “Kicking & Screaming,” “Diary of a Mad Black Woman” (featuring a god-awful lead), and “Mean Girls.” I still have the “Mean Girls” review printed out and pinned to my wall here in Bloomington

For better or worse, none of those are available on the IDS’s Web site. But a couple of the news stories I wrote are. They can be found at:

UITS workers see nightlife behind the tech desk

I had a really hard time with this article. I had a Saturday night meeting scheduled with the guys at UITS (24-hour tech support for IU students…what a concept) and missed it two weeks in a row. It was scheduled for like 3 a.m., so I had a hard time making it. Missed it the first time because I was out drinking and I overslept the second time. Probably deserve a golf clap for that one.

Union Board shows free films at Whittenberger Auditorium

This story was at a more conventional time (5 p.m.-ish). My favorite memory from this story is finding out that the original Leatherface from “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” would be on campus that semester. I went to the screening and met him, which was pretty cool.

All I can say is that I tried. I remember the editors at the time were really complimentary of my articles, but that was about it. Maybe if someone had taken a little more interest in me, you never know if I would have dove in further down that path. Or if I had thrown myself further into it…can’t blame anyone, but I guess I can wonder a little.

I liked working at the IDS, but I didn’t love it. I didn’t really know anyone, and I was shyer than I am now (great trait for a journalist I know), so I was never very comfortable in that news room. I’m trying to integrate myself further into the news room at the DN, so people are going to get to know me whether they like it or not We’re shooting for the former here.

I signed up for an accounting class and was hoping to sign up for J100 – the introductory journalism class – in the fall, but it was full and I had to put it off until the spring. I hated the accounting class and it has ended up being one of only two classes I ever dropped in college (the other being EDPSY 250, partially because I didn’t like the teacher and also because I just wasn’t putting any effort into that class at that time).

I never ended up taking the J100 class. I had a very successful first semester in the music classes that I took. For whatever reason, I’ve always been pretty strong at music theory (well, at least traditional music theory; going into German 6ths and what not can easily get confusing). Since I was successful at music, I thought that would be the right choice for me and decided to transfer to Ball State in the fall as I (still) feel that the music education program at BSU is superior to IU’s.

Again, I wonder what would have happened if I had taken that J100 class. Would I have found a joy in journalism sooner? Where would I be now? I guess I’ll never know the answer to that.

I do not regret my decision. I found that regret is just needless pining for the past. I just move on and do the best that I can with where I am. I did not expect to still be in school at 24, but I can live with the (hopeful) fact that I will be done with school by the time I’m 25 with a master’s degree.

Also, if I didn’t go to Ball State, I wouldn’t have met so many great people that I now know. I wouldn’t be in my fraternity. And I wouldn’t have as good of a relationship with my mother as I do now. So, no, I don’t think I made a mistake in choosing music originally. I think I just took a unique path to get where I am now.

When I was in high school, I was always an avid newspaper reader. I was the kid who actually enjoyed those current events assignments because they were pretty easy as I already read the newspaper daily.

I don’t think my thoughts of journalism went very far at the time. This is partially because the quality of training at my high school consisted of one journalism class and a newspaper that probably printed two issues a semester. It didn’t really seem worth my time, especially as I was more wrapped up in band classes during high school (yes, I was a “band geek”; I think earning a degree in music education does free me from such ridicule though).

I was an avid movie watcher in high school. I probably knocked out at least one movie a day, barring some sort of conflict. In the back of my head, I would consider the possibility of being a film critic someday.

I know that I once e-mailed Leonard Maltin asking him what it would take to become a critic. He replied with some half-baked answer about not directly wanting to support future critics but encouraging me to just write. It was such a strange reply to me that I didn’t really know what to make of it.

I (write ‘I’ at the beginning of too many sentences) did take his advice and tried to write some reviews. They are more than likely buried in the hard drive of one of my old desktops, and have slowly seeped into our riverbeds and tap water as I have no idea where those computers are (for those of you concerned, yes I dispose of my broken technology appropriately and try to recycle as much as I can. You’re welcome Earth) and no idea how to publish things online – the idea of creating my own blog still seemed foreign even though I had dabbled in Web technology since I was about 10.

Eventually, I did end up writing some reviews that were published (which I will discuss more when I talk about my year at IU), and I still critique movies with my 4-star scale (the definitive way to judge movies) whenever I go to the theater or watch something on TV.

At the end of the day, I was still a dumb high schooler who had no idea what he wanted to do with life. The most interesting thing to me when I look back is that those seeds of wanting to write and be involved in some sort of journalism or writing were already planted in my head then. It just took time for those ideas to germinate to where I am now.

I tried to think of some creative ways to document the process. How could I best tell my story of what this experience is like? That’s why I decided that the blogging format would be the best way to record my adventures of the next eight months or so (and hopefully beyond).

I decided that I will start by going backwards. What led me to the point that copy editing sounded like a fun career? There are many people – including journalists – to whom the process of editing and fact checking hold no joy. Yet I have taken to it like a duck to water for some reason.

In trying to decide how far back I should go in this self-analysis, I have broken it up into a multitude of parts. I’m looking as far back as my high school days to understand what steps I ended up taking to become a journalists – along with how I missed out on reaching this decision for years.

So, that’s the plan. Most of these blog posts over Winter Break will largely be some looking back to prepare to look forward to this summer. Feel free to let me know if you like what I’m doing, or if I have already been left to check on what Brangelina or the water-skiing squirrel is up to.

Thanks everyone for reading! This should be a fun adventure.

P.S. Does anyone else feel like Doogie Howser when they’re blogging? Maybe it’s just me.