Self Doubt, Interrupted

As I listened to a speech in the Great Hall at Parliament House in Canberra, waiting to receive my Bachelor of Arts degree, I pondered the significance of the occasion.  Here I was, after six and a half years of multiple essays, presentations and exams; countless tutes, lectures and lecturers; numerous psychological breaks, meltdown and tantrums; thousands of dollars of textbooks; one stupid, incomprehensible textbook that now has a broken spine; many late nights; too many deadlines; hundreds of headaches and panadols; two eye glasses upgrades; and one computer meltdown. 

But yesterday, none of that mattered, as I was about to receive that all-important piece of paper; a symbol of hard work, perserverance and commitment.  But it also represented something much more important to me.  Yesterday I had a bit of a personal breakthrough.  Despite my life-long questioning of my ability to do just about anything, I gave myself a break and thought: "I earnt this, damn it!  I'm wearing a friggin' mortar board on my head, so I fit in here as much as anybody else".

I certainly wasn't so calm and collected when I entered the Great Hall, as I discovered that my old foes, anxiety and self doubt, also wanted a piece of the action. The two graduands who were to be seated next to me arrived soon after, and we spent the next half hour in friendly chit chat; covering uni, career options, current work, travel, family. 

As usual, I was a good 15 years older than most of the kids in the room.  Which is probably for the best, because I would likely have just joined the public service after graduation if I had gone to uni straight out of school.  And if I had joined the public service in my twenties then I would, without a doubt, hate it even more than I do now.  Which is a sobering thought.

Of course we also discussed the more pressing matters of the day, like graduation shoe choice, our hair styles, the appropriateness of certain outfits for such an occasion, the thickness of the robes' fabric, the gradient and workmanship of the ramp we were to come down, and reassuring each other that it was strong and sturdy, and how incredibly intelligent we all looked, and would probably never look again. 

In that half an hour, Anita, Kristy and I - brought together by the ordering of our surnames - became each other's sounding board.  When times are uncertain, people tend to stick together; and we worked through an important social process.  Most of the graduands would have been feeling some type of nervous anxiety, and, looking around me, everyone was expressing it in different ways. 

Some people were sitting quietly, some needed to chat, some fiddled, some closed their eyes, and some were completely indifferent and played angry birds on their mobile phones.  For me, my interaction with these two complete strangers got me through that last half hour, and shot down my internal anxieties and doubts.  Group information processing to release nervous energy and anxiety - often we don't even realise its importance in everyday contexts in getting us through moments that we perceive to be bigger than we can handle.

Graduation shoes

In a couple of weeks I will graduate with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Finally.

I was never terribly good at school when I was a young thing, but my brain isn't crash hot at storing long-term memories, so I really have no idea what I actually did with my time, but I do recall that I didn't open too many textbooks. So, despite a lack of real evidence that it would be a particularly good idea, seven years ago I decided to go to uni after a good, solid ten years out of the education system.

Like many mature-age students, I struggled at first. The reading matter was impossible (not difficult, just too left-wing for my liking - that'll teach me for studying humanities), the workload was demanding, and everyone else that seemed to be in my orbit was about 42 years younger than me. So that was tops. I studied full-time and worked part-time, and then I studied part-time and worked full-time. Nothing worked really well for me, and it all sucked for a good few years, but, looking back, I wouldn't change a thing.

So now I am going to my graduation in March.  Although I refuse to believe they won't make me do an extra unit until I actually get that piece of parchment in my hand. Before I started telling people about my graduation, I was all calm and chill about it. Then people, as they are wont to do, started to warn me about things to do, things not to do, things to avoid, etc etc etc. So now I am quite terrified about the looming graduation.

First, there's the shoes. See, I don't really care about shoes. They are a boring topic of conversation, and there is not much to discuss once you finish yakking about the brand, the style, the cut, the colour. I don't care about stupid shoes. Some people do, and that's cool, but I don't care for conversations about shoes. But now I am quite obsessed about what foot attire I should wear to my graduation, because someone told me to be careful about walking up the stairs to receive my degree because it would be terribly embarassing to trip and fall.  Why the hell did she need to plant that seed of destruction inside my head?
 



Actually, the possibility that I will trip over in public, thus humiliating myself in front of hundreds of people, is something that I would likely have come up with all by myself.   I didn't need her help in feeding my insecurities and lack of confidence in walking up a couple of stairs in front of a bored, therefore judgemental, bunch of people.  And then she just told me not to stress about it and to stop overanalysing. Well, I actually have quite a gift for overanalysing. And, besides, if people could just stop overanalysing all by themselves, I would have just wasted four years of my degree studying psychology.  If people could work out how to get rid of anxiety all by themselves there would be no need for psychologists.     

 

Education

People often ask me why I get so wound up about left-wing academics. Well it's most likely because I have had to put up with them for the past six and a half years at university. I spent those years pretending to understand and vaguely put up with their never-ending, idiotic obsessions with Marxism, feminism and socialist ideals; ideals that fail to work in the state that I like to call reality.

Humans just don't possess innate socialist tendencies. When was the last time you heard about someone winning the lotto and separating the money EQUALLY throughout their community? Yes, never, it doesn't happen, because humans don't behave like that. It's just not the way we are.

Well, guess what? I’m free of uni and I’m not indoctrinated – quite the opposite in fact. I really had no idea how truly deluded from reality politics academics were until I began uni, and now I am feeling a new freedom in my life, and I'll never have to put up with them again, nor should anyone else have to.

The left-wing ("let us control the schools and in a generation nobody will be able to read") propaganda machine is alive and well in early education institutions as well. If I were a primary school kid these days, I would be pretty annoyed every day going into my state-sponsored torture chamber, more commonly known as a public school classroom, because I wouldn't be spending my days learning how to read and write, and by the time I got to Year 12, I probably wouldn't have a clue what Australia Day commemorates because the Education Unions insist that I'm taught things like how racist and anti-feminist the Constitution is.

And I wouldn't feel right about getting ahead in the world (see: getting a job promotion, for example), because the politically correct progressives who run my school would have taught me that no-one deserves to be smarter than anyone else.

Public education at any level in Australia is not about education, it’s about indoctrination. Teaching only a section of history and ignoring the rest that doesn’t fit in with their left-wing ideology (see: Marxism, feminism etc) has nothing to do with learning or letting the students decide on the facts for themselves. It’s simply about brainwashing, and it starts during the earliest years of schooling. Unfortunately, those cunning academics at the tertiary level have geniously created a system that protects them from having to do their jobs properly – it’s called “tenure”.

The Titanic and my reluctant acceptance of James Cameron

Six and a half years ago I was required to provide a presentation on a topic of my choosing for my first ever university presentation. One evening I was in my local Public Library in Canberra, browsing the shelves, the old fashioned way, when I came across a book about sunken ocean liners, written by Robert Ballard, the man credited with discovering the underwater graves of many of the twentieth centuries great ocean liners.

I sat on the floor and read, glued to the pages, book after book; I couldn’t get enough information about the Titanic, Lusitania, Mauritania, Britannic, etc. And so began my inexplicable obsession with sunken ocean liners.

I created a visually powerful powerpoint presentation full of simplified diagrams of bulkheads, icebergs, keels and lifeboats. I spoke of tales of survival and of tragedy, and of the notorious mis-quotes prior to the maiden voyage, that are in retrospect easy targets for derision with the benefit of hindsight of the cause of the tragedy.

My new obsession turned the chore of completing the assessment into a remarkably simple task. After my presentation, I reluctantly returned my books to the library, and decided that I would continue this research when I had time. These ocean floor monoliths weren't going anywhere.

That was in 2004, and I have thought alot about these ocean liners since then. I have no idea why, or what forms the basis for my interest. It just intrigues the hell out of me. The fate of the Titanic is a terribly tragic story. The desperation of one man to achieve greatness and supremacy in the eyes of his peers, and the world, enabled him to envisage the most spectacular ocean liner ever seen, but it also contrived to push him to challenge the forces of mother nature and ignore all calls to logic and reason.

His vain attempt to make history by pushing his super liner through a field of insurmountable icebergs is one of history’s great dramatic ironies, and one of its most well-documented tragedies.

The Britannic was equal in size to her sister Titanic. And like Titanic, she did not take one paying passenger to their destination. Her life as a luxury ocean liner was never to be. Her exquisite livery and interior was stripped before her maiden voyage, when she was requisitioned as a hospital ship to serve her country in World War One. She now lies on the floor of the Atlantic, mortally wounded from a missile attack during the war.

I’ve recently watched the movie Titanic on DVD, for about the hundredth time. I unfortunately didn’t get to see it on the big screen when it was released for some reason. And, for the first time, I watched the commentary components, which were fascinating. The director, James Cameron, has a real passion for the wreck and paid great respect to the tragedy through film.

I’ve never much liked Cameron. Despite my admiration for the talents of various people in Hollywood, I tend to view their liberal political beliefs as largely hokum. When it comes to politics, I try to separate the man from the ball, but Hollywood people don’t make it easy.

Their views are largely devoid of any reason or logic, and if they could coherently explain their views to the public without resorting to completely incomprehensible gibberish that misquotes and ignores facts, most people would call for their heads.

Their political views are just an appeal to emotion; an unrelenting devotion and worship to the environment and any other cause that is popular with the Hollywood elite on any given day. (As opposed to an actual religion, as they are EVIL, as you must be an atheist to fit in with Hollywood types.)

Cameron is your typical left wing Hollywood windbag, who insists on dictating to others how they should live, the taxes they should pay, the cars they should drive, the correct toilet paper to use, the carbon footprint they should leave. I don’t care that Cameron is richer than God, that’s not my beef.

Just because you are wealthy doesn't mean that you can tell us how we should live; all the while flying around in your private jet, lighting up your own house like a damn Christmas tree, and rallying politicians to hit the peasants with ridiculous energy saving taxes that do little more than make the Hollywood smug-set feel good about themselves. It’s hypocritical and plain dishonest.

Anyway, so I read that Cameron has been to the Titanic wreck many, many times to film and has quite the connection to the sunken ocean liner. So now I am forced to like him, which is a great annoyance to me.

The finished product

Not especially happy with it.  I conducted my interview two days before the assignment was due, which wasn't very smart in hindsight.  Indeed, not much time, but all I really needed to do was a bit of editing and cutting and pasting. However, for the second time this week, I experienced equipment malfunction. This time it was the microphone, and I didn’t realise the problem until after the interview, which was mighty helpful.

I spent a good few hours playing around with Audacity, trying to bring up the sound through manipulating (ie amplifying) the recording. It’s not my best effort by a long shot, but it's done now.

Getting talent / the pressures of student journalism

Getting talent

I started my talent search earlier than I did for the first interview; however I am further behind now than I was last time at this point. A few weeks ago I emailed the ACT Police with a request for an interview on youth crime and the importance of the home environment . They returned my email saying they were not able to comment on the precursors of youth crime, but suggested I try youth justice organisations or the Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC). I emailed the AIC and they told me they focus exclusively on national research, and the best people to talk to would be the ACT Police. And round and round we go.

The pressures of journalism

I am starting to understand why some journalists are heavy drinkers! One week to go until the last assessment of BJ1 is due and my interview fell through. The talent didn’t pull out, I didn’t pull out, the edirol pulled out!! Well, it didn’t work, at any rate. Whenever I pick up an edirol from the university, I always sit in my car and double check that it works. Just in case. Today I needed to rush back to work, so I figured it would be okay because it's always okay. Well, it wasn’t okay today! The side dial was not working. Half an hour before my interview I noticed this malfunction, and contacted the talent to rearrange another time, which fortunately he agreed to.

A POSTSCRIPT:

Have now figured out the side dial on the edirol is not vital in this instance because it is set up correctly by the previous student who borrowed it. Darn it! Now I have to return this edirol on Tuesday, go back to uni on Wednesday morning to get another one, do my interview on Wednesday night, then return the edirol on Thursday morning. Oh, this is very tedious trying to get away from work during the day.

Have I started yet? Have I started yet? No

So far, I am doing okay in BJ1. Which is remarkable, given my lack of confidence in broadcast journalism. I love the writing process of journalism, but not the interviewing part, and definitely not the "perform live" part. Just my personality I guess. But I digress.

In my time-honoured tradition, I have not started researching for assessment 3. In my first assessment, I spoke to the ACT Scouts Arts Convener, who told me a new Arts Centre is slated to open in the Tuggeranong Valley in the next few months. It is designed to encourage young people to learn new skills in a safe environment, presumably where they will stay out of trouble. The Scouts are a great organisation, but I can't help thinking it's nothing but a bandaid solution.

For me, the obvious other side of the debate is talking to the other people who are trying to stop the youth crime wave, like the police. Although I could speak to local community groups or businesses who have been victims and are powerless to stop the problem. Data from the Bureau of Statistics show that youth crime in Canberra is high. So ultimately, I need to talk to someone who admits there is a big problem, and they don't know what to do about it.

The finished Product

This assignment has caused me alot of stress! There are just too many things that can go wrong. But I've learnt a few things that I will take to the next assignment. The list is by no means exhaustive:

* plug the mircophone into the correct socket of the Edirol.
* Arrange an interview MUCH EARLIER.
* Have 1 or 2 back-up interviews in place for when the first one inevitably pulls out, or changes the interview time at the last minute etc.
* I sound like I'm trying to hard when I try to hard - just try and relax when taping.
* Make sure I tee up an Edirol when I actually have an interview in place.

My main problem is that I didn't give myself enough time. I can easily blame fulltime work, but really it is about my lack of time management, in this case.

I'm not overly excited with the finished product, but I've learnt that I need to give myself more time to dig for a good story and edit the final product.

My voice

Of most benefit were the breathing exercises, although I dislike my voice at the best of times. It sounds deep and monotone, and I really can’t stand hearing it, to be honest. Fortunately, I have no plans to unleash my voice onto the general public as a radio newsperson. It's probably best for everyone.

The talent, Audacity

Getting the talent

One week before my assessment 2 radio interview is due for completion, and I decide to change my story. Well, not so much as a change of mind; more a case of a better story with a stronger news angle coming along.

A few weeks earlier I had tried unsuccessfully to contact a man from the ACT Scouts who was opening a new Arts facility for young people in the Tuggeranong Valley. I had heard about it through a church group. Days before my other interview was due to take place, the man from Scouts contacted me to say he was happy to talk to me about the facility.

Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show that Canberra has a young population, and it also has the highest rate of youth crime in Australia, so a new community arts facility for young people run by the ACT Scouts seemed like a good path to a newsworthy story.

The Interview

The interview was quite stressful and uncomfortable for me, even though I kept saying to myself just do the best you can; we’ll, the best I can do with zero experience in broadcast journalism! I learnt that it is hard to maintain your composure and dignity when you are obsessively checking your equipment for malfunction; when you are trying intently to listen to the answers so you can ask an intelligent and probing question in your umm and ahh free “radio voice”; when you are trying to emphasise key words, but end up sounding like a kid whose voice has just broken.

That same night, I watched Tracey Grimshaw conduct a difficult and confronting interview on A Current Affair and discovered a new appreciation for live interview broadcasting.

Editing

As far as uni assessments go, I am quite enjoying the process of editing my radio interview. Although, I started to cull pauses and umms and ahhs without realising they provide important context in various parts of the interview. My talent may have been pausing for a reason, I thought to myself. I imagine it can become a bit like botox – once you start primping and culling and cropping, you can’t stop until it is completely unrecognisable from the original product. So I started again…

NB: Very happy that I can use Audacity from the comfort of my own laptop.

Pre-interview concerns - of which there are many

Pre-interview concerns - with Edirol, the editing process, and with the technology in general!

The technology

I'm more of a print media kind of girl, but I'm quite enjoying radio journalism. But the technology in BJ1 has me all stressed out. I've never been much of a first responder in an IT emergency. I mostly learn what I need to know through an exhaustive stressful process, particularly for the poor sucker who has to explain it to me. My laptop and I get along for the most part, even though we speak different languages and have diverse views on the meaning of ‘logic’ and ‘practical’.

Edirol

As a general rule, I know that any piece of technology that comes with two pages of instructions is going to give me a headache. However, I find the edirols fairly easy to negotiate. I haven’t interviewed my talent yet, but am playing around with my voice on the edirol so I can look/sound a little bit accomplished when I’m in the hot seat. For example, practicing cutting out the umms and aghs and, in my naivety, trying to sound like an ABC reporter. Then, I download onto Audacity and I can’t understand how to manipulate it! If only we had to do a high-pitched, quick tempo interview in reverse English, then I’d be fine. Note to self: Must develop the voice box of Elmer Fudd so no-one will be the wiser…

The editing process

Resistance is futile, but so enticing. As is throwing my computer out the window. I have never been so frustrated with information technology as I have become today. How is this Audacity audio equipment so technical and complicated? Any why can’t I be of the Y Generation and/or a computer passionista to figure it out? I desperately need an instruction booklet, or a USEFUL help manual, other than that American ‘Audacity Guy’, who I found through Google. He is of no help. I need practical help, like “if you need to do this, you should perhaps use this tool, or this tool”. I want to be able to edit my radio interview to within an inch of perfection (pending my hideous radio voice) but I don’t know how to! I will need to contact the audio guys at UC on Monday. They know stuff.

Researching for Assign No. 2

Researching my topic for assignment 2 – what have I learnt?

I was going to do a story on a new soup kitchen starting up in Kambah. Then I thought about the lack of car parking in the Woden Town Centre. Then I happened upon a roller skater from the Canberra Roller Derby League (CRDL). As with many good stories you come across, I found out about the CRDL via a conversation in the kitchen at work. I tossed around a couple of news angles. CRDL have a bout coming up; a new report released says the overall cost to the taxpayer to manage obesity is $5 billion a year. That’s $5 billion. What better way to get fit and stay lean that roller skating round a rink? Surely you’d be too terrified of being pushed to the ground to worry about whether you’ve burnt off enough calories?

I became intrigued about the punk-style, third wave feminism take on the 60s craze that is roller derby, with its alliterations to pop culture and the double entendre stage names that are used by its competitors. Is this a sport or is this sports entertainment? Do we have Jerry Springer type entertainment on our hands? The roller derby has taken off in the States again; with all-women, self managed leagues cropping up all over the place. And if attendance figures at the previous two bouts in Canberra are any indication, it will be taking Canberra by storm. So what has happened to nice quiet Canberra with its Brumby-loving football fans? I decided to delve into the world to find out, through an interviewer with Bullseye Betty, President of the CRDL.

Baby e-steps

This is practically my first blog ever.  I have become a blogger because I have to. Which is good. I think. In order to complete my Jounalism Major, I am required to create a 'reflective blog' as part of my assessment for the unit of Broadcast Journalism. And so I will reflect, and then reflect some more... Although, I must admit I am not comfortable with the idea of a cyber-diary, and I approach the e-journal world with a degree of trepidation. I mean, aren't diaries supposed to be hidden under the bed?

And the whole idea that you can protect your blogged privates is of little comfort. What happens if the internet is hacked by balaclava-clad nerds intent on exposing my thoughts to the world?  On second thoughts, I think I'll be okay if that's the worst that can happen. Why can't I possess the self-conceit of that Generation Y - happy to share their deepest, darkest thoughts and endless snapshots of drunken escapades with multiple 'friends' and strangers alike? I guess I'm self-aware enough to know that no-one really cares what I write because most people online are too busy with their own blogged, facebooked lives to care.

I always thought that blogs are for extroverts and the 'me, me, me generation' with their hallmark narcissistic tendencies - everyone should read about me because I am endlessly fascinating etc. Sure, I am on Facebook, replete with friends, some with origins unknown, but only because everyone else is.  I was starting to feel like I was being left behind at a random bus stop on a dark night in the middle of nowhere on the information superhighway.

What can I say, the e-pressure got the best of me, so I jumped on the band-width wagon. Now I have many friends, from the past and present, and am left wondering what the facebook generation will do when they realise that some people are meant to be left in the past. I suppose deleting them from a friends list is no different, and perhaps easier, than promising each other you'll catch up soon.

I'm done, until next time I reflect.....