off the beat

I got to be, dare I say it, not only popular, but relevant — or at least I felt like I was. And it’s the fear that I will never again capital-M Matter that haunts me.

It wasn’t long before I woke up and smelled the coffee. Boba was consuming me faster than I was consuming it, and I wanted out.

Newsroom diversity (in every sense of the word) is paramount not only to quality — fair and thorough sourcing and reporting — but also a sense of belonging.

I think, in many ways, being in love is a lot like being in college. It is, without a doubt, beautiful, full of opportunities and an experience no one will ever forget. At the same time (and this is what movies and relatives don’t tell you about college or love), they will also cause you more pain than you can imagine.

And if you feel like you don’t have enough time, just rearrange your priorities. It’s not complicated, but it isn’t easy — I’m still learning how to do it.

As I finally approach graduation, and quite possibly the end of my formal schooling, I find myself desperately wanting to prolong this part of my life. For someone who agonized and stressed over every paper I wrote, I’m suddenly struck with wanting nothing more than to keep on doing just that.

My dad has always told me growing up, “Only worry about what you can control.” I don’t have a car to control anymore. And I sure can’t control the world around me right now. All I can control is myself.

Whenever I came home, my dog conducted a full-on sniffing investigation out of suspicion, and I couldn’t help but feel a bit guilty; I was cheating on my dog.

And that’s when it hits me — to my mom, it was never about me being a doctor or a straight-A student or the overachiever that I’d ended up becoming. She’d been saying it for eight years: What she wanted was for me to be a good person.

I told Goodreads which books by men I had just read, and Goodreads, understandably, would automatically recommend other books by men.