Maddison's Musings

Last weekend, I was lucky enough to attend the ILPC Journalism Conference at the University of Texas at Austin with my journalism class. I had so much fun in Austin with my friends, plus I got to go to sessions and listen to real life journalists at my dream university. Although I won't be attending UT Austin this fall, when I do transfer over in the next year or two, I'll already know my way around campus a bit, which is nice.

I woke up at 5:45 in the morning on Saturday, April 22nd to make it to school by 6:30 to catch the bus to Austin, and by the grace of God, I somehow listened to my alarms and made it to school on time. I am not a morning person whatsoever, especially not when you add a four hour long bus ride into the equation. I was feeling a bit nervous, mostly fearing my long history of motion sickness (especially on buses), but I was braced with enough peppermint essential oil and hospital-grade vomit bags to survive the weekend (and about 40 more). Again, by the grace of God, I made it to Austin without being sick. Although I was clutching onto the barf bag, I never actually had to use it. As it turns out, I just need to make sure it's there, and that calmed me down enough.

Onto more pleasant and relevant things, once we finally made it to Austin, I was beyond excited to finally get out into the city and explore the campus and the sessions. We hopped off the bus and made our way into the main building to get checked in. Once checked in, we got to walk around and pick up a bunch of free things while we waited until it was time to listen to the keynote speaker. Let me tell you a little something about free things: I love them. I don't care what you're giving me, but if it's free, I will gladly take it. I got sticky notes, a cool light up pen, a drawstring bag, a little notebook, and some candy. A great haul. We also got to see our school newspaper out on one of the tables filled with school publications from around Texas, so that was pretty cool, but I was mainly just there for the free things. By the time I picked up every free thing I could possibly pick up, it was time to go listen to the keynote speaker. The keynote speaker shared stories of her time as a journalist, which was a nice and inspiring way to get the conference started. Once her talk was over, we were dismissed to go eat and then head to the sessions.

One of the cool things about UT Austin, and most college campuses, is that there's tons of stuff to do within walking distance. When we broke for lunch, we were able to walk to Guadeloupe St (also known as "The Drag") and chose from one of the many places to eat. I chose to head to Einstein Bros Bagels, aka heaven on Earth. I sat and nibbled on a bagel and sipped some coffee, enjoying the free wifi the bagel shop offered (but the multi-million dollar college campus didn't? okay, sure that makes sense), as I watched college students walk by the large windows. Before I knew it, time was up and it was time to head to my first session. I walked leisurely to the building the session was in and took a seat in the old-fashioned desks, excitedly waiting for the session to begin. The session was about working as a writing freelancer, which is great, because I know I'll do some freelance writing in the future. I learned a lot of things in the session, and took plenty of notes, which made me happy.

Once my first session was over, I waited for my second session to start, which was coincidentally in the same room. The second session I attended was about breaking into the journalism world, and again, I got plenty of notes, and left feeling inspired and ready to start writing something. Once that session was over, I went to my third session, which I picked at random, if we're being honest, and I still have no idea what it was about. All I know is that the lights were dim, the chairs were comfortable, I was running off of four hours of sleep from the night before, and the guy doing the session had a really calming voice. It's a miracle I didn't drift off. Once that session was over, I picked another one at random, and ended up at an investigative journalism session. I thought it might be cool, but as it turns out, investigative journalism deals with a lot of sad shit, so that's not the career path for me.

Finally, all four sessions of the first day were over, and it was nearing time to get to the hotel, or so I thought. We ended up staying for an award ceremony thing, and we didn't even win, so I don't know why we were there, then after that, we left to go to a mall to eat and shop a bit before heading to the hotel. Once everything was finally over, we got to the hotel around 8:30 pm. I was completely ready to flop into bed and call it a night, but no trip would be complete without hotel drama. We picked our rooms at random, just picking the first key we saw from the pile as we stepped off the bus, which is never a good idea. We get up to our room, put the key in the door, and swing it open to reveal a room with one bed. Keep in mind that I was rooming with three other girls. The four of us were desperately trying to work out a situation, when our teacher walks in, realizes the situation and says, and I quote, "well this is some fucking shit." I was laughing for a good ten minutes. Our teacher doesn't really swear, and even though I curse all the time, I still laugh at any profanity, especially when said by a quiet person who hardly swears. It was a simple fix, all we had to do was switch rooms with our teacher, but hearing him curse cracked me up so much that I found myself giggling hours later when I thought about it. With the room fiasco fixed, we settled into our new room with two large beds and got ready to go hang out in another room to play games with a few other kids. We ended up playing Cards Against Humanity, Spoons, and The Voting Game until well after midnight. I learned way too much about some people with the voting game, but we were too busy laughing our asses off that we didn't care. Eventually, we all tired out, and the four of us went back to our room to get some well-deserved rest.

Another day, another early wake up call. Up at seven and gone by 7:30, it's a miracle I made it out alive (aka without any coffee). We left the hotel early enough to travel to Round Rock Donuts, a place known for their giant donuts. Once we were pumped full of enough sugar to last a lifetime, or at least a few hours, we were back on the road to Austin. By the time we got to UT, the first sessions of the day were about to start. My friends and I decided to skip the sessions and head to Starbucks, where we ended up playing a two hour long game of Uno without a winner, as nobody had won by the time we had to get back to meet up with the rest of the group. Again, we went to another award ceremony where we didn't win anything, then headed back to Guadeloupe St to get lunch before hitting the road to go home. I ended up getting yet another bagel, then I walked around and admired the campus for a bit until we got back on the bus to head home. On our way home, we made a quick pit stop at Buc-ee's, aka the most Texan place in the universe. It's insane, and I love it. By the time we finally made it home, it was 5:30 pm, and I had listened to Panic! at the Disco's entire discography. Not a bad way to end the weekend.

Overall, this was one of the best weekends I've had, especially in high school. I got to hang out with so many wonderful friends, explore a cool city/campus, and experience a kick-ass journalism conference. My only regret is that I didn't join my school newspaper sooner so that I could have experienced this trip more than once, but at least I got to experience this trip at all. I hope everyone gets to experience a trip like this in their life.

Some pictures from Austin (some can be found in this Instagram post):

Austin has some rad street art

Class where I attended my first two sessions

I was really proud of having 666, until I realized it's upside down (and it might be 999 I still can't tell the difference between 6 and 9 in Uno)

My friends and I got matching bracelets aren't we just the cutest

More cute street art damn I love Austin

~Maddison

I was originally going to make this a book vs film adaptation type of post, but decided that both the book Thirteen Reasons Why and film/Netflix adaptation 13 Reasons Why are both equally important. As a book lover and a writer, I love the book. Each time I read it I find myself unable to put it down, fully invested in the story. When I first started the Netflix version of the show, I was annoyed with how much the show differed from the book, but after a little research, where I learned that the author of the book was apart of the whole process, I was able to separate the book and the show in my mind, and enjoy the show a lot more. In the book, the main character Clay listens to all the tapes in one night then passes them off the next morning, so we really only hear Clay's commentary and how he processes everything, unlike in the show, where he takes days to finish the tapes, but we get to learn more about the other characters and their struggles. Either way, Hannah's story gets told, and that's what's really important. When I first read the book a few years ago, it changed my outlook on how I view the world and how I treat people. You never really know what people are going through and what someone else is struggling with, so it's important to treat everyone fairly and nicely. Now, a few years later, the show is giving the same message. I think it's important that this book was also made into a show because it allows people who maybe don't like to read to get this important message as well.

All differences aside, both the book and Netflix adaptation are super important, especially to young teens/adults. They book/show deal with the heavy concepts of suicide, rape/sexual assault, slut shaming, guilt, etc, and it's not something to be taken lightly. In her tapes, Hannah mentions the snowball effect, which is defined by the Cambridge dictionary as "a situation in which something increases in size or importance at a faster and faster rate" it can also mean "everything leads to everything," which is accurate in Thirteen Reasons Why. While figuring out what happened to her life and why it went to shit, Hannah makes a list of everyone who ever mistreated her, then she narrows down the list to thirteen people, her thirteen reasons. Each story she tells is connected somehow, and she shares that everything is connected, and whether the person thinks what they did was insignificant or not, it was significant to her.

Thirteen Reasons Why is not a book/show to be taken lightly. It deals with triggering topics, so I thought I should include links to posts where people listed triggers (they'll also be embedded below). This post is more general, with descriptions of triggers in each episode, while this post breaks it down with specific time stamps for the most triggering scenes.

Also, can we just take a minute and think about how diverse the cast is? I mean, just look at this picture. It's beautiful!! Justin is the only white character in this entire screenshot!! It's so beautiful and powerful to have such an important show have so many people of color. Also, there's gay/LGBTQ+ people!! And not just one!! It's truly amazing, and I'm so proud of this show for being so diverse- that deserves an award itself.

Overall, no matter who you are, I think it's important that everyone reads the book and/or watches the Netflix adaptation. The story being told is way too important to be passed on, even though it deals with heavy concepts and triggers. The story makes you look at your life and evaluate how you treat others and how you see the world. Hopefully, the story can help shape you into a more thoughtful person, or at least into someone who can learn to recognize that your actions have consequences, no matter how insignificant you feel they might be. Also, I hope that if you're feeling how Hannah did, you know that there's always a reason to stay alive.

~Maddison