The Peace of Chocolate

I’ll admit I did not relish the thought of another attempt at blogging after the first round in the 501 class. It took me the entire course to adjust to the fact that I was really in grad school. Getting my Master’s degree had always been at the top of my bucket list. It took me until the early spring of 2010 to erode most of the mental roadblocks that kept me from beginning the journey. The rest of the mental challenges came throughout that first course. As much as I embraced the challenge of learning something new, it became painfully obvious how much I really didn’t know.

It’s not the writing itself that I perceived to be the challenge, but the type of writing. It became one of many boulders I had to wrestle. I write all day every day. I write radio news in the form of little tiny pieces, like a mini M&M. Every story I write has to be told in 20 seconds or less, 35 seconds if I add a soundbite. (On the M&M scale, that puts TV news at the size of your standard chocolate M&M and newspaper on par with the peanut M&M.)  You can imagine that for me, the concept of exploring a topic of my choosing at my leisure was slightly more foreign than a dead language.

So, while trying to keep my head from exploding in my desparate search for a topic, I grabbed my support jar, and unwrapped a piece of chocolate filled with oozing caramel. Once on my tongue, I was able to breathe deeply and avert a growing panic attack. All of the worry, concern and quest for sheer perfection seemed to melt away in that one bite, as it usually did. I try to have at least a piece of chocolate in some form at least once every day. I find it calms the nerves and keeps me from jumping through the insanity gate before the starter gun goes off. Then once I’m settled and breathing slow and steady, I can work things out and push forward. That’s when it hit me – why not write about chocolate?

Writing is egotistical.

That phrase helped seal the deal. All the writing I do everyday really belongs to someone else. But this blog and my writing for this course is about what led me to pursue this degree in the first place. It’s all about me. It’s about what I want and what makes me happy. It’s about getting out what I put in and finding satisfaction and success in the result. It’s all on my terms. It’s very much like a chocolate pound cake made from scratch with a mocha drizzle icing. Believe me when I say that delicious number takes a lot of ingredients, time and patience, but it is SO worth it in the end. And like this blog, I’m more than willing to share, except for the last piece. That peace is all mine.

Biosketch

I am a single mother with a 12-year-old middle school boy, living in Indianapolis, Indiana where the best holiday revolves around the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing” and the #18 is a holy number.

I am 100% Hoosier. I was born and raised in Indy. I even went to college here. I lived outside of the city for 6 years at the beginning of my marriage for a horrible experiment in rural Indiana. We moved back to the hometown right before 9/11 and have stayed here ever since.

I was always involved in the performing arts as a kid and lived for the theatre and showchoir in high school. When it came time for college, my parents half-heartedly supported my quest for fame and fortune but strongly encouraged me to come up with a 2^nd major as a backup plan. That’s when I chose Radio/TV. Teachers always said go with your strengths and I figured my greatest strength besides singing was talking. I specialized in Production because it fit nicely with my Music degree and I figured I could still get them both done in 4 years. Once I took my first media class my sophomore year, I was hooked. I eventually dropped my Music major to a minor and never looked back. My passion started out in video production, but eventually I narrowed in on anything radio. I felt like radio was more diverse and allowed me to be more than just a reporter, just a producer or just a videographer. One of my professors persuaded me to lean toward radio news, despite my interest in copywriting and production. I used to dream of combining my talents of music and copywriting to be the next commercial jingle sensation, 2^nd only to Barry Manilow. But, somehow his suggestion stuck with me and has been the focal point of my employment existence since my senior year.

After graduation, I thought I’d cut my teeth in a small rural market for a year or two, then make my way to the big city. 12 years later, I finally got that job of a lifetime (or so I thought) at the flagship news/talk station in our state’s capital. I was just in time for mass layoffs, format changes, and hostile management takeovers.  After 3 and a half years, I decided I needed options. The radio industry is changing rapidly and no one is really sure what direction it is taking. I determined that a Master’s degree in Interactive Communications was the best ticket for giving myself the options I desire in a changing world while helping me decide what I want to be when I grow up. Plus, after a 13-year marriage-gone-wrong-before-it-began, I wanted something that was all mine with no parental, spousal, or mentor influence.

I’m an avid volunteer and have remained active in my alma mater. I spend a lot of time mentoring college and high school kids. I come from a long line of teachers so it’s no surprise that my second love is education. One of the options that this QU degree will give me is the option to teach in higher education.

I still enjoy music, although I don’t write nearly as much as I once did. I coach children in voice for music auditions and watch A LOT of football. That is my son’s passion so it has become mine as well. And considering he stands 5’9” and 172 lbs. at 12 years of age and hasn’t hit that big growth spurt yet, he just might become that pro-athlete that could make his mother comfortable.

Writing Sample

It’s official in my book.
Indianapolis is a football town.
I can’t believe I’m actually admitting it outloud.
Back in the day, Indianapolis was 100% basketball. Oh sure, The Indianapolis Colts came to town in 1986 to live in the Hoosier Dome (Sorry RCA, it will always be that to me), but the foundation of basketball went well beyond that. The grand old ABA days are what put Indianapolis and basketball on the map. But now I realize the city had been living off of the reputation of the state. College and high school basketball reigned supreme with some of the best names in the game spawned from Hoosier ground.
In college, the Big Ten meant basketball with a delicious rivalry between the Indiana Hoosiers and the Purdue Boilermakers that got everyone’s attention. I remember being in the 8^th grade on a language trip to Mexico and watching IU in the 1987 championship game from a bar in the hotel in Mexico City. (Not to worry, the only beverage consumed was soda.) Members of our group were the only ones in the bar from Indiana, but there were enough Americans in the house just as interested in the game to dominate the TV in the joint. It was huge! The only other thing I remember about that trip is buying silver in a town in the mountains and the gigantic cockroach in our hotel room in Acapulco (teenage girls and bugs DO NOT mix).
High school basketball in Indiana is so historic, one of its greatest stories is immortalized in film. Hoosiers just wasn’t a movie, it was a mantra for all high schools with basketball teams. It was practically Bible study for anyone who believed David could face Goliath and win. Basketball night in Indiana was a way of life for the entire family. That is, until the multi-class system was enacted in 1998.
So when did Indianapolis become a football town?
I can’t tell you. All I know is that when rhetoric from “Manning Bowl 2” lasts days after the game long enough to shadow Pacers Media Day, there’s been a disturbance in the force. I can’t tell you the last time I went to a basketball game and enjoyed it.  It doesn’t help when the home team is riddled with criminal activity. The disaster in Detroit didn’t help matters but when the team is continually plagued with headlines profiling drugs, illegal weapons, and domestic violence, there’s a problem that runs deeper than just one incident.
In Kent Sterling’s blog post  September 16^th, 2010 he identifies a problem that is not specific to Indiana, but a problem with the NBA as an industry:

How can a kid become an adult if everything is done for him? How about someone from the front office teaching the rookies to look for a place, call the electric company, DirecTV, gas, and water. Call the electric company for a boy, he can read tonight. Teach him to call for himself and he can read at night forever.
With guaranteed contracts and the constant coddling of young players, the NBA has created a culture of fools who have no idea how to live their lives. They are no held emotionally accountable for their errors in judgment, that occasionally have casualties.

And now,  I find myself scheduling my life around football.
And it’s not just the Colts. It’s the local high school games and college games, too. Even my 12-year-old son is in the game that has my attention. It used to be the only high school football games played in the pro stadium were the state championships. Now there’s tons of classics and invitationals featuring high school teams playing in the big stadium.  Usually if the Colts aren’t at home in Lucas Oil Stadium, 2 high school teams are keeping the turf active from August through October.
Once upon a time I gave my heart to Reggie Miller. Now it belongs to Dwight Freeney. I’ve gone from the paint to the red zone and I don’t know when it happened.
Maybe Indianapolis has always been a football town that just needed some inspiration.
All I know is that the goodwill of the Colts, the legacy of college ball (You Go Purdue! With your Kyle Orton & Drew Brees alums!), and the enthusiasm of high school play has made Indianapolis my football town.