Looking Back, and Ahead

It was Election Day 2004 that triggered my decision to upend my life: to leave my job and become the world's oldest grad student (or so it seemed).

Actually, it wasn't so much a decision as it was an epiphany after Zach and I spent a day poll-watching in what was supposed to have been the battleground state of Florida.

The universe doesn't generally choose to speak to me, but it did that day. Or perhaps it speaks to me all the time, but on that particular day I was so depleted and raw that the message came right through. I remember feeling physically and emotionally exhausted after a long day in the Florida sun, having been whipsawed by the mid-day exit polls and the late-night results.

But more than that, I remember the despair I felt as we watched the returns on television, when the coverage seemed like a horrible cross between a game show, a reality show, and Entertainment Tonight. When CNN flashed its "Breaking News" graphic and cut to Wolf Blitzer in front of the gigantic, illuminated U.S. map, I didn't know what to expect. When Blitzer announced, with a straight face, that the big news was the introduction of a new color on the map—white, to designate Ohio as undecided—I had to leave the room.

Elections, especially presidential elections, are arguably the heart of our democracy. To see this one covered with the same inanity that now graces Olympic broadcasts—after everything the country had been through four years before—was more than I could bear.

And somehow that disgust and frustration, coupled with sleep deprivation and borderline heat stroke, propelled me to the realization that I could and should be doing something entirely different with my life.

Cancer didn't do that.

Neither did 9/11.

But Bush and Blitzer did.

It happened on the plane ride home. I was absolutely bawling, and trying to calm myself by watching The West Wing on JetBlue's seat-back screen. Immersing myself in the alternate reality of a fictional administration was the best coping strategy I could come up with. The grief was real: I was in mourning for my country. And for our culture.

There, in my leather seat, wearing a two-dollar headset and watching DirecTV, I heard the word "journalism" pop into my head. And the more I listened, the more sense it made.

It's funny, because I don't now and never did want to be a political reporter. In fact, I'm not yet sure exactly what it is I want to write about. But I think the what is far less important than the how, and about that I have no doubts: honorably, meaningfully, and, above all, truthfully.

In 10 weeks, I'll return to school full-time, and five months later—barring any surprises—I will finally graduate. I have no idea what I'll be doing after that. But perhaps the universe will whisper to me once again.

I only hope I'll be able to hear it.