Coming full circle with a final deadline

Maybe this is the way to end my Daily Bruin career ““ with a deadline looming near, and facing possibly the worst case of writer’s block I have had in several years. It seems, in a way, oddly fitting that it should end this way, because it is almost identical to the way it started.

Nearly three years ago, I began my Daily Bruin career writing an article with a sense of nervousness about beginning my foray into journalism, claiming writer’s block to delay my entry into the field.

Now, three years later, I once again find myself making the same claim, but this time, I do so out of nostalgia and a desire to delay my inevitable exit from the world of news reporting.

You see, with the end of this column comes not only the end of my time here at the Daily Bruin, but in all likelihood, the end of my time as a journalist, generally. And, as definitive as that statement may sound, I do believe it to be true, and so, I hope you’ll allow me to indulge myself in a few extra column inches.

For the past few years, journalism and the Daily Bruin have been my way of asking questions that I wanted answered, of learning new skills and applying new ideas, and perhaps most importantly, of meeting new people and seeing new things and having the opportunity to tell their stories.

I got to tell the story about the speaker on campus that many did not see but who still deserved to be heard; the story of the bakery chef to whom few could assign a name or a face but whose pastries most have certainly tasted; the story of a presidential campaign that took our campus by storm and a neighborhood council election that hasn’t; and, the story of which I am most proud, of a mural hidden behind a wall for the better part of two decades, whose history was finally told in print publication nearly 40 years after its painting.

For me, each of these stories, and the others I wrote, were important ““ not necessarily because of what they said, but because they allowed me to connect with this campus in a way that I otherwise couldn’t have. They were my window into worlds other than my own and my link to this university’s past, its present and, I hope, its future as well.

For all that, I will be ever thankful for my time at the Daily Bruin.

With these words, my journalism career officially comes to an end. For the rest of my life, I will return to consuming the news. But for the past three years, at least, I got to write it.

Doshi was the Enterprise editor in 2010 and a News reporter for 2008-2009.