Good gaawd!

What a crazy couple of days.

And this was only (DIS)orientation.

The good people at J-School threw more heat at us than Gagne in a pivotal 9th inning. My head is spinning. And if you see me on the street, don’t let my calm demeanor fool you: It’s officially safe to say I’m crying for my mommy on the inside. It’s no longer a question of if I’m over my head, but how much.

Yesterday we had this cocktail hour in between orientation and a faculty panel discussion on journalism ethics. Always good to get a bunch of grad students sauced up before talking about ethics, I find. Actually, the East Coast ran with the Rather apology 15 minutes before this panel, which was one of those weird, beautiful coincidences. So you throw an hour’s worth of alcohol into the mix and you’ve got one hell of a lively discussion.

And even yours truly, on the first day of, well, anything, in front of a hundred people, and a bunch of prestigious Time/NY Times/Wash Post/You-Name-It intimidating journalists raised his hand and offered his two cents on Rathergate. (Those last 2 Bud Lights probably had something to do with it.) I think I sounded coherent enough. And hell – I just pretended I was leaving one of my usual obnoxious comments in this blogosphere.

Afterwards I joined up with a group of fellow incoming grad students on the “L” going home. This turned into a ride down to Lakeview, where we had drinks at this bar just up from Wrigley on Clark – about six of us. I can’t adequately describe how cool it’s been, over the last two days, meeting all these new faces from all over the country – all with the same calling, the same hopes and - more realistically - fears about J-school, really the same passions about journalism. Everyone was telling the same story, just with different details. Until last night I didn’t realize just how different this grad program is from, say, your Law or Med or Biz – you know, the programs that are actually guaranteed to give you a financial return on your investment and then some. I’m surrounded by people who have felt the same ultra-specific calling. (It’s no coincidence that comparisons to the priesthood were dropped repeatedly yesterday. One prof even called it the priesthood “mercifully without that whole ‘chastity’ thing.”)

But it’s so refreshing – I’m just really, really stoked and amazed to be in this class, at this school. Of course, everyone else I talk to is far more interesting than me – we’ve got people who friggin worked at NASA, at the UN, hell, an Iraqi-American. We’ve even got the guy who came in third place this year in the Midwest air guitar tournament…but such is life. I’m gonna learn tons here. If I don’t flunk out, that is. Wish me luck.

(Oh, and if you’re wondering how hard it was to keep my mouth shut when the Chair of Reporting and Writing mentioned how nice it was that our campus was right up next to “the beach,” well, it was very hard. But somehow I managed it. I did, however, express my severe disapproval to another professor later, who had never met me. Needless to say, I think I made an interesting impression.)