Why Don't You Shout Out My Name?

So I'm trying my darndest to update this blog as often as possible--daily if I'm lucky. But no one is THAT lucky. This is going to sound weird, but I feel instantly more attached to writing in this thing because not only has it become a bit more therapeutic as of late, but it's also gotten a lot more meaningful. I know I'm forever away from having a child or getting a smart enough dog to be able to read this, but just knowing that sometime in the future, someone that means so much to me is going to be able to read this and maybe get something from it is kind of amazing to think about.

With that said, here's lesson 2:

Things are often better than you think they are. Remember how I was bitching and moaning about my boss yesterday? Well, I still have my problems with her and probably always will until one of us leaves, but you know how people always say you should take a walk in somebody else's shoes (or maybe since this is years into the future no one walks, but hover-bikes or something everywhere and doesn't wear shoes! Wow, that'd be so cool. Well, if we have become so incredibly technologically advanced and lazy that we don't use our feet, shoes are basically clothes for your footies)? Well, you should. Or at least talk to someone who knows how it feels to be in your object of un-desire's shoes.

After work today, I was surprised by one of my absolute favorite reporters at the station when she invited myself, another associate producer, and two other senior producers to happy hour with her to thank us for all the work we've helped her with. I was supposed to go for a run after work to keep my training for the SF half marathon up, but hey, when beer and fried food is involved, why would I say no? If you are truly related to me, you'll understand. If you are truly related to me, you're probably eating or drinking something unhealthy for you RIGHT NOW. If you're not...just know that I'm a little ashamed. If you're offended by that...you need to learn your father's humor.

So we get to talking, and I find myself in a potpourri of girls aged 22 to 40 something. It's like being on the View (or that new ripoff of the View, the Talk. GREAT titles everyone. If you don't know what these shows are, do a Google search. Or Wikipedia it. It'll probably say something like "meaningless show where intelligent woman obnoxiously self-promote their own viewpoints on something and the unintelligent ones do the same thing except with stupider viewpoints" For the Talk, it'll probably say the same thing except with the phrase "but worse"), except I'm the Asian girl, but not really a girl. Me and the other AP are both the newest people at the station and when everyone's gone except my favorite reporter, she asks us how we felt about work and the people.

I was honest and told her about how hard of a time I have working with my boss. And she told me, "you do know she thinks the world of you, right?" The AP chimed in saying "yeah, she's always asking where you are, relying on you to do things." This shocked the crap out of me. Like, I literally may have turded my pants a little when I heard this. The reporter told me that my boss, like I said previously, just has a bad way of relating to people and has a hard time reassuring people of how positively she sees them. She agreed, she can be annoying and difficult to deal with like a case of the herps (well, she didn't say that; that was a self-drawn simile), but my boss is in a very difficult situation right now. Riding a spiral down from a demotion and a downsizing of her department that she manages, she has no control over the fate of her job at the station. Likely, she is freaking out herself and possibly taking it out on all of us. The reporter wisely told me that nothing is forever and until you can find out a way to change your circumstances, you need to make the experience what you want and need it to be and it never hurts to have compassion for ANYONE, even if it is the boss you dislike. She also reiterated something I truly believe in, and that is the fact that I sincerely believe things happen for a reason. I am not religious, but I do believe in a higher power that is pushing my life in certain directions; I can't think of any other way that my life has been this blessed and good.

So there you go. Things aren't as bad as you think they are. I thought my boss thought I was the biggest, laziest dumbass in the world, but turns out she actually likes me. She even admitted to me this morning that she has come to rely on me and congratulated me when I was offered the chance to write for the weekend news (which sucks because that means I have to work on the weekend, but hey, whatever). And, I never stopped to stand in her shoes and think about why she's the way she is and I never stopped to give her some compassion and empathy.

I guess there's two lessons here: as a follow up to yesterday's lesson of not taking life too seriously, also look at your life and see that things aren't always as bad as you make them out to be at surface value. And also, always be kind. Always have compassion. Almost everyone deserves that.

Lesson 2.5: Fridays are the best.

Love,

P

Bernhoft - Choices

Shake it Out, Shake it Out

So if you haven't noticed, I've given my blog a quick face-lift and have also decided to take my blog in a different direction. Don't worry--if you are one of my few readers who actually enjoys reading about my life and whatnot, those posts are still gonna make it on here, but the main focus of my blog now is to teach my future child(ren) lessons from my life.

I know, I know, I know, I always say that I hate kids, that I'm horrible with children, and that I don't want them, but the more I think about it, I believe I'll end up with at least one. Part of the fun in having a kid, at least to me, is nurturing another person to become someone better than you are, to educate them on the best way to lead a life--and that's what I'm hoping to do. In the process, I'm sure I'll learn a lot more about myself and how I choose to live. I'm no genius or licensed life coach, but my family and friends have taught me more than four years of a really expensive private college education and it is my hope that whatever fruits that fall from my loins can reap the benefits of the fortunes and lessons that have been given to me by all who enrich my life.

So here's the start of an online anthology of what I hope will give my future son, daughter, or maybe a dog, a brighter and self-assured outlook on a life that is bound to be difficult, frustrating, wonderful, enlightening, saddening, joyous, crazy, and most of all...worth it.

Here's lesson 1:

Don't take life too seriously--especially your work life. Son/daughter/Spot, when you start your first job in the real world, as many people have wisely told me, you are going to encounter the BIGGEST douches of your life. They will annoy you, they will pester you, they will micro-manage you, they will degrade you, and did I mention really annoy you? Case in point, my first boss at my first job. A super-traditional Chinese lady (who may or may not be like your future mom...let's hope not) who is irreverent, lacks any fiber of tact in her sinewy body, and I'm assuming with old age, can't seem to see past her sphere of professional work.

If I haven't told you already, kid, my first job is an associate producer with the local news in San Francisco. You may or may not choose to follow in my journalism footsteps, but a newsroom is a place where you need to see the big picture. You're producing several live shows a day and just because you get assigned one task doesn't mean you won't get pulled to another. So today, my boss told me to make calls to set up a story after our morning production meeting. Sure, cake. Make the calls, but no one's in the offices yet so I left voicemails, let my boss know, and went to work on writing some scripts for the show that she also assigned me. Cut to an hour later and a senior producer asks me to go out on a shoot with her. Gladly! Wipe to my boss calling me and asking me where I was when the producer I was with told her that I was leaving. My boss tells me to hurry back because I need to finish writing the scripts. Of course! Fade out. Fade in to me walking back to the newsroom and my boss immediately asking me if I had set up the stories yet. I reply that I've only been back a few minutes and haven't had a chance to check my voicemails. Transition to a reporter telling me to produce her voiceover for the five o'clock show which comes with several roadbumps. And finally a dramatic finish with me making deadline for the reporter's live-shot three minutes before air time. I'm patting myself on the back when my boss comes over and tells me she's been on the phone for ten minutes, set up the story from this morning and that I need to be more aggressive when setting something up. She reasoned "what if we needed to shoot that story today?" She touted how easily she was able to set up a shoot and harped on the fact that I had failed and that apparently was my only work for the day, as I should've been making calls up until I left for the shoot and not write the scripts she assigned me to write...or something.

I could've told her "hey lady. YOU gave me work to do while trying to pursue this story. YOU told me it didn't have to be turned for today. YOU told me to produce the reporter's VO. YOU told me to work on other things. Why is it MY fault that I had no time to set-up an interview?YOU apparently had the time, so why didn't YOU take the initiative and do it yourself in the first place? SURE I should be more aggressive, but I need TIME to be aggressive." Now that would've felt good to say, but I didn't of course. Because, my child, your father has self-control. And, I would've gotten fired.

But here's where the real lesson is. In the workplace, sometimes you have to drop your feelings at the door. No matter what industry it is. No matter how passionate you are about your job, how much you love your coworkers, you're likely going to fuck up or be in a position where you feel attacked and feel like you've been wronged when you shouldn't have to. But that's life, buddy. You just have to learn to bite your tongue, maybe even until it bleeds, because the truth of the matter is, you're not getting paid to have someone be nice to you. Sometimes, you'll need to look at it as your boss trying to better you--being hard on you because she wants you to be better. Sure, it may not be the most constructive way, but to each their own right? There's probably a reason why your boss is your boss. You don't have to agree with how you're treated, but what you have to do is not take everything to heart (and believe me, that's hard to do, especially if you have my blood in your veins, 'cause your pop-pop is a crier and a very very sensitive man) and believe that no matter how much you feel like punching your boss in the ovaries and titty-slapping her boobs, it's a learning experience and probably most of the time, your boss doesn't mean to sound like a douche. Some people just never learn how to speak to others in a way that is both constructive and polite. So give people a chance, don't sweat it, and keep your mouth shut. Take solace in the fact that once YOU get up to the top, you'll treat your colleagues better. You'll be better. And maybe, once you're at the top, you can look back and say 'thank you. thank you for being an asshole.' Because your boss being an asshole just might've helped you to where you wanna be.

All the best m'boy/girl/puppy.

Much love. Enjoy the first lesson.

Florence + the Machine - Shake it Out

Waiting for a Ride in the Dark

'ELLO! So it's been a while since I've blogged! Nothing too new going on in my life, but I've been contemplating a lot of things about my life lately. Starting to re-evaluate my desires of being in the news industry and my feelings about the news world in general. So if you're not ready to read rambling horribly written stream-of-consciousness the Sound and the Fury shit, then you should probably hit the back button and go read some Married to the Sea comics or something (because THEY're hilarious; I read them all the way home on the bus today and chuckled so much someone got up from the seat next to me and literally scurried away...that and I had my wiener out....jk...sorta).

Anyways, it's been about two months into this job and I'm still not loving it, but it's tolerable and I'm really feeling like I'm learning a lot and garnering skills that are good to have (yeah, my sisters were right), albeit, I don't know how much I'll use them depending on where I want to end up, but it's definitely not a bad thing. But I think I've come to the realization that I don't think I can be in this industry for forever. It's too confining, too corporate, too manufactured--all things I don't think journalism should be. The more experiences I have in this job and in this field, I come to see that the news, at least on a local level is just not for me. I feel like I can't be myself and can't utilize who I am as a person to contribute as meaningfully as I'd like to.

I am passionate about journalism because I strongly believe in being informed, mining stories from people that the public wouldn't get to hear otherwise, and invigorating the minds of viewers and readers--as journalists, we are storytellers, raconteurs. At this station, I don't see this. On this level, we have become a business, a machine. From what I can see, we aggregate stories from other sources and regurgitate them. We don't hunt for the stories as regularly as I think we should--I feel we lack originality. Granted, maybe the intentions of my news director and the producers and the reporters are to create original and interesting content, but whether by business and monetary circumstances, the intentions aren't backed by anything substantive.

And I can't handle this whole corporate ladder feeling in the newsroom. My supervisor told me I'd have to play a lot of "office politics" to get ahead in this industry. But why?! For most who know me, I'm a horrible ass-kisser. I don't think your position and your stature in a company should dictate how much affected behavior and fake respect you should get. Your character, your proven work ethic, and your respect for others as far as I'm concerned, should be the only barometers for how much reverence you get from me. I shouldn't have to stick my nose up your anus and sniff your colon to get ahead. I should be recognized for my determination to be a good journalist, producer, writer, whatever role you need me for. Now there's a fine line between learning from those above you and forming a bond with them to get the best education you can and just being a tool and riding someone's dick to get ahead. The way I see it, if you learn and put your best foot forward and get ahead that way, you'll be way better off than the ass-kisser who got ahead with nothing to show for it. I'm not saying this newsroom is a horrible representation of this type of environment. I've met great people who have taken me under their wing, but there are also a good number of people eating crap for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and in-between-meal snacks to get on the higher-ups good sides. Sure, they may be the faves, but I can say that for myself, I can't go home and feel good about it.

I just can't wait to be in a leadership position where I treat interns like I treat my most experienced. I can't wait to treat a team like equals where people don't need to plot out their next move in the newsroom or office. I can't wait to be a kickass leader-man.

I also can't get with how ironically inhuman this industry is. I remember the first week I worked here, the executive producer was approached by our assignment editor who told him "a kid fell out his window, should we send a crew there?" And my EP's response? "did he die? I only care if he died." What? WHAT. I remember that moment vividly because that was one of the first times I've actually felt my heart drop. I couldn't believe I was part of the newsroom, part of the machine at that moment. And there have been numerous times when stories about death, about disaster, about true human experiences that my colleagues laugh-off as not "newsworthy" because it's not "sexy" enough, won't draw in enough viewers. I know it's the real world and if we don't get viewers we don't have a news program, but that's just my problem with it precisely. I know it's not a perfect world...but it's just not for me. This is why I think I'm so in love with documentary films. They tell stories that are compelling without sacrificing the human aspect. It tells a story that doesn't necessarily "matter" but it allows us as a people to more deeply connect by hearing a (wo)man's story. Journalism shouldn't be all about the fire that killed a mother of two, or that Target is eliminating Cadmium from their jewelry lines. It has it's place...but I guess it's not for me.

Anywayyysssss this is hella long and I hope you clicked back a long time ago because this is probably only interesting to read to me.

But I'll end this on a funny note that I mentioned on my Facebook.

I was going to the bathroom the other day to head back to my desk and my favorite producer (who unfortunately transferred to a station in San Diego today) was having a really animated discussion with a writer in which she decided to take off her cardigan. The problem was she was wearing a loose-fitting camisole underneath with no bra. So when she took off her cardigan her camisole almost came off and her right boob half slipped out. I just so happen to make eye contact with her right when I walked by and she gave me a very "ew, perv!" glare. It wasn't my fault! But I can see why she might think I was trying to sneak a peek at her bubbie.

I need to find some time to type up the other awkward stories that have happened to me here in the Bay Area...but until next time...

Happy weekend,

P

M83 - Midnight City