I'm not going to lie, I never have a clue what to post on my blog, which is why I have been MIA for quite some time. But coming home always brings up numerous questions from my family:

"How is school?"
"How are classes?"
"Have you been doing anything for your career?"
"What are you going to do with a journalism degree?"
"Are you actually going to be a writer?"
"What are you going to do?"

Chill out everyone. This is what I want to tell everyone. Sometimes, I do. But really, it is kind of daunting thinking about what is going to happen after college.

I have realized though, that I am comfortable having a degree in something that is nearly universally needed, even if, as they all say, "newspapers are dying" and what not. I commented on someone else's blog once that if you can write well, you are better off than 95% of the rest of the people in the world. (thanks Jeff Unger)

I believe that.

Whether we actually do become reporters and work for a newspaper and uncover scandals by being watchdogs of the government and corporations or whether we go into politics or public relations or editing or graphics and design or business...we will be needed because we have been educated in researching, asking questions, talking to people, getting answers, finding a story, finding the truth, being accurate, writing clearly, writing thoughtfully, writing enticingly...writing well. I can' tell you how many times I have been asked to proofread a friend's paper or help my brother with his stories.

I feel like I have become more interested in everything around me and more educated on topics I knew nothing about by being forced to be immersed in the news. Knowing about what goes on in the world, knowing how to explain it, and knowing how to follow it and further people's knowledge of it is something very little people know and know how to do.

While I am just as nervous as the next person about getting a job and making money, I am completely satisfied in what I have been educated in.