Scare Tactics Not Appreciated

As usual, Mom was right and I have recovered from last night's meltdown and have come to realize that I can handle this semester just as I handled all the rest.

I got my journalism beat today and I'm covering my hometown, which is good because I have contacts from my high school internship with the local councilman. I'm about to email his office to let them know that I'm back, only this time on the other side of the fence. It'll be so nice to go back to the office and see them and I know if I ever need to figure out who to talk to for a story, they'll have just the person for me to contact (which means I'm already a step ahead of everyone else :)

After we got our beats my professor continued to tell us how difficult the class was going to be and advised us to think long and hard about if we will have the time to dedicate to it. I tried not to let anything he was saying register since I don't actually have a choice in taking this class (unless I want to graduate sans journalism degree.)

I don't understand why teachers are so hell-bent on scaring us poor students. In 5th grade it was all about how grown-up we would have to be in middle school. (I mean we were losing recess - if that's not shutting the door on childhood, I don't know what is.) Three years later, it was how independent we'd have to be in high school. Halfway through high school, our AP classes were supposed to take us to the edge intellectually. I eventually learned not to let any of that talk scare me, since everything had proven to be much better than the teachers made it out to be.

I did, however, take heed my senior year of high school when we'd complain and our teachers would tell us that this work was nothing compared to what was waiting to greet us in college. But although they were right in that our grades comprise of only three or four assignments and the only homework we get is reading, I've once again prevailed and have made better grades than I did even in high school. So why is it that I'm so worried that this class will be any different?

I tend to do this type of thing irrationally freak out at certain things. Mom keeps telling me not to underestimate myself, and I really wish I could stop. This whole getting scared easily thing will do nothing to help me in the future.

But, little did I know that something as mundane as opening my email would put me in a much better mood. This afternoon, I got unbelievably excited when I opened up my inbox, and right there was a reply from that individual I've been trying to get a comment for the article from for the past few days. He responded just in time for me to add his comments into my article and submit it on deadline. Seriously, when I opened that email I was insanely overjoyed. (I'll admit there was a little celebratory jumping up and down involved.) Finally, my article was complete! And I know that despite all the fear and dread that came with writing this article, it'll all be worth it when I open up the newspaper and see my byline and my words printed on the page.

P.S. Forgot to mention this earlier, but we had the assignment meeting for the monthly newspaper I'm co-editor-in-chief of, and it went really well. We had a good size group show up and they all took articles. Ok, so now I can stop worrying about whether we'll actually have a newspaper to put out in October.