First, I want to say thank you to my amazing team of creators, as well as our president, Brooke Albright, and our EIC, Alyssa Paluch. And, of course, our helpers from Headquarters.
My choice of leaving doesn't have anything to do with the Odyssey itself, but rather the piss-poor content I've produced in an attempt to participate weekly.
I mean, "13 Reasons To Watch 'Supernatural'"? Please.
I wrote that pile of you-know-what in about fifteen minutes. Very rarely have I produced anything worth reading. The few times I wrote something I was passionate about, the feeling that filled me was beautiful and unrivaled. It reminded me of why I loved writing. But, while I struggled to come up with ideas for listicles every week, my novel sat in my Google Docs, unopened.
Journalism has never appealed to me. I joined Odyssey the summer before my freshman year at Rowan to meet some new people. This has worked. The last two years, I've definitely felt as though I have a support system in our Rowan Odyssey group.
But, even from the start, I felt as though something was.... missing. I've always loved to write, but this format wasn't exactly working for me. I did my best because my mom loved my articles and said I had a future in journalism. After reading back, I think she was definitely lying to me.
The happiest I've been while writing for Odyssey was the brief stint I had as a contributing editor. I loved editing and helping my fellow teammates with their articles. As tedious as repairing grammatical errors and format mistakes were, it was so much more fulfilling. Eventually, we changed our leadership format, and I was disappointed because the writing had become my least favorite part about Odyssey.
That was several months ago, and I've fought it as best I can because I do appreciate this company and my teammates. Not everything I've produced has been something to be embarrassed of. But after I took two weeks off for vacation, I found that I wrote more than I have in forever.
Even then, it was only about 300 words, but it was fiction, something I love writing. Without worrying and tossing article ideas over in my head, I actually accomplished something.
I am incredibly thankful for my time as a content creator for Odyssey, but I feel as though the time has come to say goodbye.
