Lost in a Positive State of Mind

The Ups and Down of Sports Writing (Final Copy)

2009-11-21T10:28:00.001-08:00

I was miserable. I was starting to realize maybe this job just is not for me. After coming close to quitting multiple times I stuck it out hoping that in three years maybe it will get better.

My dream is to become a sports journalist and my first step toward that goal was to write for the UMBC student newspaper. I wrote on my high school newspaper but it was more of a quarterly flier than anything. Weekly dead lines, 700 word counts, interviews, it was all so new to me. But I wanted to at least give it a shot.

When I went to my first meeting there was already an issue out, meaning I was just there to take what ever assignment was left. I wanted to write men’s soccer because I’ve known the coach my entire life, but that wasn’t an option. Women’s soccer was all that was left. While I almost walked out, I took it anyway. That is where I was second guessing my dream. They were not fun to watch, I had to write about a game that nothing happened in, and had to talk to people who just did not want to talk.

But after sticking it out things took a turn up. I covered two championship teams, and a team that had their best season in 10 years. I was promoted to head sports writer, received a significant pay raise, and got a lot of experience writing.

It turned out the sports writing gig isn’t so bad and it may work out.

The point: Your dreams aren’t just achieved, you have to work toward them.

It' always darkest before the dawn

2009-11-19T16:07:00.000-08:00

The moment I stepped on the campus as UMBC I knew that my main goal was to write for the campus newspaper. My dream was to be a professional sports writer and this was my chance to practice it. I always loved sports. I always liked talking about them. This was my chance to take a big step during my dream. But I knew there would be challenges. I’ve never writen for a newspaper before. I wrote for my high school paper just one year and it was more of a quartely flier than a newspaper. Weekly deadlines, interviewing, word counts, it was all so new to me, but I was determined to at least give it a shot.

When I went to my first meeting there was already one issue of the paper out, meaning assignments had already been given out and I was there to just take what ever was left. I went in wanting to write men’s soccer. I’ve known the coach my whole life and wanted to write for his team, but that wasn’t an option. My choices were to leave or cover a women’s soccer team who did not even win a game the season before. Though I was very tempted to just walk away bcause at that point the sport of soccer was still new to me, I took the assignment just to get on the paper and figured that maybe by my senior year I could move up.

I was miserable. The team just did not play well, I was forced to sit and watch a team get shut out twice a week, and I had to write 700 words on a game that nothing happened in. Was this what I was going to have to do every day after I graduated? I started to think this sports writing gig is not all it’s cracked up to be. I came close to quitting a few times but every time I did something prevented me from speaking, possibly my brain telling me I’m going to have to work my way up before I cover anything big.

Well, it turned out that things went a lot faster for me after I stuck it out. My next three teams to cover were the men’s basketball team, who nobody wanted because they had a bad losing tradition, baseball, who nobody wanted for the same reason, and men’s lacrosse, who nobody else wanted because they lost a lot of talent and were expected to do poorly. But as it turned out the basketball and lacrosse teams each won a conference tournament and the baseball team had their best season in 10 years. I was promoted to head sports writer, received a significant pay raise, and I was well known by everybody in the athletic department because not only want I working hard to cover the sports (during march I wrote eight articles a wek because the seasons were overlapping and I had to cover basketball, men’s lacrosse, baseball, track and field, and several features that went with those articles) but I was getting great experience in writing and then was granted men’s soccer the following year.

Now, I’m thrilled, having fun, writing what I enjoy.

The Point: You have to work your way up and do things you do not enjoy before you you dreams can come true.

Talking the Talk

2009-11-10T21:34:00.000-08:00

Word Count: 225

If anybody has met either me or my brother they will know that we are both very outgoing people and not afraid to speak up. While that does not seem like it is uncommon, when looking at our cousins who are all shy it is quite interesting. But it did not happen by accident.

When I was growing up there was one major thing that caused my outgoing nature. Whenever I wanted to know something I had to be the one to ask it. It did not matter if I was five, my dad would not be the one to speak up and ask somebody a question for me.

If I wanted to sell something for a school Christmas drive, I had to be the one to call up and ask people to buy stuff, neither he nor my mother would call up for us. If I wanted a refill on soda at a restaurant, I had to get the waitresses attention and ask her.

While I never quite understood why my dad had to put me in an awkward situation of interacting with strangers when I was little I realize now how beneficial it was and why he did it and I’m thankful for it because I now have very good social skills, unlike my cousins or many other people I know my age.

Point of Story: The only way to become a social person is to be a social person. Waiting for somebody else to strike up a conversation is not the way to be a social person you have to be willing to put up with the early awkward situation to become impervious to it later.

High School was Great, Middle School- not so much

2009-11-03T13:40:00.000-08:00

Word Count: 188

I remember the exact moment I realized how great my educational experience at Calvert Hall was. I was sitting in my economics lecture of 200 people with my friends, who was thinking about joining but decided not to because she was afraid of big lectures. I was not afraid of any big lectures like my friend, I had two a day for four years of high schools it was nothing new to me. That and scheduled free periods in high school to teach you how to manage your breaks in college were taken for granted, but looking back they were great.

I thought going into middle school it was going to be great, but they really tried to make it a college prep middle school, as odd as that sounds. We got pushed into majors and half our day was spent studying that. I was not interested in any of them at the time but I was stuck with it. I was not ready to have that type of education but had to, it was not very enjoyable, there was too much work and I was only 11.

Poker Night- More Than About Card Games

2009-10-18T12:09:00.000-07:00

Word Count: 254

I believe in poker night. It’s a night where friends get together and enjoy themselves. There is no need for money, just competitiveness. There is nothing to lose except the gratification of victory.

It’s a night of six friends, sitting around a round table sharing stories or their week and making jokes to make the others laugh.

It’s a night of doing what you want. There is usually a bowl of chips and dip, nachos, sandwiches, sodas, water, and more often than not beer.

It’s a night where guys can just be themselves. Unless your significant other is part of the group they are not invited because at Poker night there is no need to impress anybody, just be yourself and have fin with your buddies.

It’s a night of bonding. You can invite new people over to play and see if they fit in with your crowd.

On poker night the card games, whether it is Texas Hold’em, Omaha, Five Draw, Five Stud, or Seven Stud, or who knows you may throw in an occasional game of Black Jack just to mix it up a little more, the game is not even the main point of the night, it’s just a setting for the fun.

Poker night is about hanging out with your friends you haven’t seen after a rough week of work or school.

It’s a time away from reality. Nothing else matters, it’s just about being with your friends and playing cards and getting away from all the problem you have.

Peace Symbol Revisited

2009-10-11T20:18:00.001-07:00

Word count: 298

The peace symbol shows that an image outweighs it’s meaning. For 51 years the peace symbol has been one of the most powerful in the world, but its meaning has changed over time. While the meaning behind it has changed, the symbol’s meaning has not.

In 1958 Gerald Holton designed the logo as a symbol for nuclear disarmament. As it seems, the symbol is simple. It has three parts, a circle, a straight line, and a v-shaped line. The three pieces superimposed created the peace symbol. From that moment the image was seen as a symbol of good and hope and…peace.

But what does each piece mean? First, the v-shaped line means the letter N (for nuclear) in semaphore flag signaling system. Next is the straight line, which is the letter D (for disarmament). Finally there is the circle, which actually has no original meaning. It was originally just added to make the symbol look better than just two lines.

In the 1960’s the image came to American and was adopted by Hippies and the intent completely changed. Hippies originally intended for the symbol to be a symbol against materialism. The image looked like a chicken’s foot and they embraced it, showing they did not care about material things. But the symbol’s meaning still did not change. The symbol was still seen as a symbol for piece rather than anti-materialism.

The symbol was then used to represent unity, as the three branches merged into one line. Also at this point the circle around the symbol had meaning- the world. The symbol was intended to mean world unity and betterment.

Despite the original meaning of nuclear disarmament, the hippie meaning of anti-materialism, and the newest intended meaning of unity, the symbol is still only known for one thing: Peace.

No Nukes? Anti-Materialism? Unity? No it means Peace

2009-10-09T18:18:00.000-07:00

Word Count: 351

The peace symbol is a perfect example of an image outweighing the meaning behind it. For 51 years the peace symbol has been one of the most powerful symbols in the world, but the meaning behind the symbol has never been the same. But no matter what the meaning behind the symbol was it still always meant peace.

In 1958 British artist Gerald Holtom designed the logo, but it was not intended to be a symbol for peace, it was intended purely to be a symbol for nuclear disarmament. As it seems, the symbol is simple. It is comprised of three parts, a circle, a straight line, and a v-shaped line. The three pieces superimposed created the peace symbol. From that moment the image was seen as a symbol of good and hope and…peace.

But what does each piece mean? First, the v-shaped line means the letter N (for nuclear) in semaphore flag signaling system. Next is the straight line, which is the letter D (for disarmament) in the semaphore flag signaling system. Finally there is the circle. But actually the circle had no original meaning. It was originally just added to make the symbol look better than just two lines.

Then the image came to America. In the 1960’s the image was adopted by Hippies and the intent completely changed. Hippies originally intended for the symbol to be a symbol against materialism. They felt the image looked like a chicken’s foot and they embraced it, showing they did not care about material things. But the meaning still did not change. The symbol was still seen as a symbol for piece rather than anti-materialism.

The symbol was then used to represent unity, as the three branches merged into one line. It was also this point that the circle around the symbol had meaning- the world. The symbol was intended to mean world unity- a united world to better life and earth.

But despite the original meaning of nuclear disarmament, the hippie meaning of anti-materialism, and the newest intended meaning of unity, the symbol is still only known for one thing: Peace.

Do the Dew and Be Cool

2009-09-29T20:44:00.000-07:00

Word count: 396

With the male desire to be seen as people who live on the edge, Mountain Dew has taken advantage of the market and branded themselves as the "extreme" drink.

What started out as a “zero-proof moonshine” has really changed its image over the years. From the 1940’s to the 1970’s Mountain Dew originally catered towards hillbillies. But then in the 1970’s Mountain Dew completely went away from that image to try and get more people to drink the product. They started to try and appeal to the believed drinkers of the product: young, active outdoors people.

With the success of attracting the young outdoors type for two decades, Mountain Dew again tried to expand their audience and in doing so they have created a lifestyle. In the 1990’s Mountain Dew moved from being an outdoors type drink to being an “extreme” drink. In 1995 Mountain Dew sponsored the first-ever X-Games, which is the Olympics for extreme sports like skateboarding and dirt biking.

Mountain Dew has stuck with this image ever since and has become very successful because of it. They try to cater to mostly young men who are not only interested in extreme sports but in just being young and hip.

Mountain Dew has definitely become known as the “extreme” and cool drink. In their ads they usually have younger men doing exciting things and drinking Mountain Dew, saying that if you drink Mountain Dew you are “extreme” and cool.

Mountain Dew has made a good decision in choosing this. Up front the advertisements say that if you drink Mountain Dew you will have a lot of energy (scene by the larges amounts of sugar in the drink but underneath it all Mountain Dew is saying that you can only been cool and extreme if you drink Mountain Dew.

This approach works because men want to be cool no matter what it takes, and if being extreme makes you cool then young men will strive to be extreme and if drinking Mountain Dew make you seem more extreme thy will drink Mountain Dew.

The reason men want to be scene as extreme though it because the cool and extreme guy tends to get the girl, which is what Mountain Dew sells, along with a good time, and it is no secret that young men want two things, fun and girls, thus making their ad effective.

Twenty Years and Two Books Later

2009-09-15T19:52:00.000-07:00

While sitting in The Commons with my friends one day at the end of my sophomore year in college, everybody was discussing what there favorite books were. It was seven of us there. My friends were naming books like The Old Man and the Sea, Pride and Prejudice, and Zombies, Harry Potter, True Blood, etc. But then my turn came and I honestly could not thing of any book I really enjoyed. To keep the conversation going and to avoid having them lecture me about how books are enjoyable I lied and said Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein. I did a senior thesis on that book in high school so I knew that if they asked me about it I could tell them.

Because I could not think of the last book I enjoyed reading I tried to just think of the last books I read. I never really enjoyed reading. It was something about staring at a gray sheet of paper with black eight-point font that always struck me as boring. But as I thought I could not think of the last book I read. I always got by school just skimming the books and searching spark notes the day before any test. Then I realized I never actually read a book all the way through since probably Go Dogs Go when I was five.

I was in denial about having never read a book but after a few days of actually trying to think of a book I read I still could only think of books I read two chapters of, got bored, and just skimmed and looked up spark notes for. I was not too worried about having never actually read a book until I realized: I’m a journalist. A journalist that doesn’t read is like a mathematician that does not us division.

With the summer near and knowing I would have a lot of down time I say this as an opportunity to actually beginning reading books, even if I did not enjoy them. This past summer I read two books, both which revolved around sports in hopes to keep my interest. I read The Blind Side (my new favorite book), which is about the Baltimore Ravens first round draft pick Michael Orr who went from being a homeless orphan to a multi-millionare in the NFL, and Red and Me, about the legendary player (Bill Russell) and coach (Red Auerbach) duo that dominated the NBA for a decade in Boston. To my surprise I really enjoyed both books. Not only is it something that I should do if I want to remain being a sports journalist, but reading the two books over the summer actually was enjoyable.

Now I can honestly say I have read a full book that wasn’t a Dr. Suess book. I have even recently bough the book The Yankee Years, which is a book by former New York Yankees manager Joe Torre who is telling the stories about his experiences in New York.

Word Count: 499

A Little About Me

2009-09-08T18:04:00.000-07:00

As you may have guessed, my name is Corey Johns. I'm a junior at UMBC double majoring in American Studies and Media and Communications Studies. One day I want to become a sports journalist. Sports are my passion. Growing up the son of a soccer coach (dad) and Orioles fanatic (mom), sports were always a major part of my life. I'm working hard to achieve my dream and currently am a sports editor/writer/photographer for The Retriever Weekly. While I also freelance write for WNST.net, my biggest project is UMBC Sports Blog, which I completely run by myself.