This is my life

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[4A]WTPNothing beats the smell of hate mail in the morning

What the Puck?
Autumn McDowell

Sports Editor

Last year at this time, I was strongly considering – actually, I was positive – that I would not be returning as sports editor this year. But here I am, suckers.

When we were required to write a page for our legacy binders last year, describing what our job entails and what our jobs were actually like, so that the successors of our positions would know what they were getting into, I wrote “you are about to start hating your life.” Then I decided to re-apply, because I must be stupid.

Originally, I did not want to return because I was putting in an insane amount of work, often writing four to six articles per week, while only getting paid for writing one of them. I’m sure many of you can understand why that frustrated me and are probably scratching your heads right now, pondering why on earth I would agree to what would work out to an hourly wage of $3.

While I did, and still do, have a passion for sports I was not sure that it was mentally safe for me to continue with that work load, did I mention I was also in four classes and working another job at this time?

Still, while I was certain that I was not going to be returning, I simply could not sit back and watch the sports section crumble, which could have very well happened had I not decided to return. At one point the option of not having a sports section if I didn’t come back was a very real possibility, but I simply could not let that happen. I worked too hard to see it disappear.

In all actuality, once I got used to receiving hate mail on a weekly basis, almost getting to the point of enjoyment upon its arrival, my job became much more tolerable.

People often wonder why I don’t promote University of Regina sports to an almost obsessive and disgusting level, congratulating them, no matter how well or how terrible they do; but that is just not my style, folks.

While I do try to give every team some coverage in the paper, and I do enjoy going to as many of the Cougars and Rams games as I can, I am a reporter, not a cheerleader.

I also wrote into my legacy binder, “at least three teams hated me because I pointed out that they sucked in a rather sarcastic way. You will learn to love that feeling.”

The way I see it, if a team loses by hundreds of points, it is my job to point that out. Perhaps I can get carried away with sarcasm sometimes, but that’s just my sense of humour. Sorry, but I cannot congratulate a team for losing by such a hideous margin, and I don’t think teams should be OK with being given mercy articles and participation awards. It’s not my fault you suck. I’m sure the hate mail will be streaming in after that one.

I don’t want to be like the other sports writers out there. That possibility went out the window the minute I was born a girl. From that moment on it became obvious that I was not going to be your average, run of the mill sports reporter.

Besides the obvious, I also believe that I have a rather unique writing style. I have recently learned that people know me by my writing, which is slightly terrifying. If you saw me in the hallway, I’ll bet you would never guess that this little girl came up with such sarcastic articles.

I hope that I have turned the sports section into something that is fun and interesting to read, and if it evokes emotions in some of you, be that positive or negative, then I feel I have done my job.

Having said all of that, although this job can be frustrating, it can also be very rewarding and barring anyone coming in and taking my job – which many teams are probably hoping for – I hope to return to give more adequate and realistic reporting of campus teams.

See you next year, kids.

Photo by Natasha Tersigni

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