A Call

I was in the honeymoon phase. 

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I'd been at the Daily for a month. There wasn't a soccer game I didn't want to cover. It all just felt so natural. The words flowed onto a page without conscious thought. My articles were going in print. I collected each one of them and taped them to the wall in my dorm. 

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It was like when I met Meg, and every conversation flowed so easily. There was no such thing as an awkward silence. Sometimes the silence said more. 

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I'd found something I was genuinely good at. 

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Then one night, I went into the newsroom. I sat down at the desk, and an elderly man sat next to me. He introduced himself as John, and I learned he came around from time to time to offer his advice to us Daily kids. 

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He had worked for years as a Tigers beat writer at the Detroit Free Press. And he told me everything — all the ledes he had written, all the events he had covered, all the athletes he had gotten to know. 

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Then he gave me his phone number, and told me to call if I ever wanted to talk. 

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I didn't wait.

 

I called him the next day, and told him that he had inspired me, that I wanted to do this for the rest of my life. It felt like some sort of divine intervention that I'd met him the night before. 

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He told me to chase the dream. 

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I called my parents immediately after I finished my conversation with John. I remember being scared — scared that they would call it a pipe dream, scared that they hadn't sent me to Michigan for a Communications degree.  But I had no choice. I told them I didn't want to apply to the business school anymore. I told them I wanted to be a sports writer. 

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Maybe I should have expected what came next. After all, my parents were never the type to be overbearing.

 

There were no judgmental questions. They didn't wonder aloud if this newfound sense of purpose was practical. 

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They told me they were proud I had discovered a passion just over a month into college. They told me to chase my dream. 

 

And so I did.