Rewards of job outweigh late-night problems, stress

  Mike Litschi Litschi likes planes,
trains and all things with lights and sirens. He wishes the 2001-02
staff good luck and reminds them to be good to their lungs and
livers.

I’ve worked at the Daily Bruin for the past three years
and spent more time in Kerckhoff 118 than most, but somehow,
I’ve managed to miss out on all the glory.

Do a search in the Daily Bruin archives and all you’ll see
are two mediocre news stories and a name in the staff box. Not much
to show for dozens of 12-hour days, hundreds of late nights in the
office and thousands of hours of work.

I didn’t see my byline on the front page every week,
photograph high-profile UCLA sports events, interview celebrities,
or get invited to parties at the chancellor’s house like some
of my colleagues. Instead, I lurked behind the scenes and tried to
keep everything running smoothly within the paper. Both as a copy
editor and managing editor, I knew I was doing my job when no one
could tell I was doing it.

People in the office ask me questions all day, but the question
I seemed to get most frequently this year was, “What exactly
do you do?”

At first I tried to explain “¦ “Well, I oversee
production, venture to the other side of “˜the wall’ to
coordinate with ads, yell “˜BUDGET’ at noon,
“˜borrow’ large numbers of cups from Ackerman, fix
computer problems, compile page 2, try to help the sections
communicate and cooperate, serve as The Bruin’s evening van
pool service… the list goes on. Oh, and I usually stay in the
office until the paper leaves at 12:30 a.m. to
“˜supervise’ and solve any problems that come up “¦
and there are almost always problems.”

But lately, I just smile and shrug my shoulders when someone
poses the question.

It’s just too hard to explain what keeps me so busy that
I’m rarely at my desk for more than 10 minutes at a time, and
then always come back to find someone else sitting there.
It’s hard to explain that I often get so distracted that I
forget to eat ““ although this is a fairly common problem
among Bruin editors. It’s hard to explain why I get so
frustrated when things don’t work out the way I know they
should. And it’s hard to explain that working six days a
week, having virtually no free time and routinely coming home at 1
a.m. to start the reading for my 9 a.m. class takes its toll after
a while.

Though working at The Bruin has been a draining experience, I
wouldn’t give it up for anything. It has tested my endurance
and enhanced my character. It has shown me that a cup of mint chip
ice cream from Baskin Robbins will cure afternoon deadline
headaches and late-night headline-writing blocks. It has expanded
my taste in music to genres I never knew existed.

It has taught me that I need to sprint out of Kerckhoff at
exactly 4:56 p.m. to get my paper to Rolfe in time for a 5 p.m.
time stamp. It has made me realize that if I don’t keep calm
in stressful situations, no one else will. And it has introduced me
to a diverse group of people whose personalities and experiences
have changed my way of thinking and whose lewd sense of humor has
made the long hours in a windowless office bearable.

There are a lot of days at The Bruin I’ll always remember,
and some I’m eager to forget. But I never imagined that a
publication that most people pick up, read briefly and then toss
aside could have such an impact on my life.

Mostly, I’m thankful because the Daily Bruin has provided
me with an experience I plan on keeping, one that proved to be a
perfect fit.