What a ride.

The Clarion has been a source of inspiration, frustration, excitement, growth and education over the past three years. From my very first week of freshman year to the end of this year, I have poured my travail and my passion into this endeavor. More than anything, the Clarion and these years have defined love, hope and perseverance for me.

The Clarion is a labor of love—it has to be. Nobody does it for the pay, for the resume booster, or for the glory. One does it because one loves it. The countless weekends spent editing and planning, the frequent struggles (that were often real) and the recently-discovered grey hair on my head wouldn’t have been worth it had it not been a labor of love for me.

I’ve found love in and through the Clarion. Love! Love in every sense of the word; love between newfound and lifelong friends, love of a cause, something larger than oneself and romantic love between two individuals.

I can’t imagine a Monday night without the Clarion. From spring 2012 until now, I’ve worked every Monday during the school year at the paper, tinkering with layout, debating with my more wily colleagues and meeting great people who would forever change my life and my outlook on it.

This, the human connection, is the most important thing about the Clarion: It connects students on campus not only through a weekly newspaper, but also through lifelong bonds of fellowship forged on Monday nights in common struggle for the greater good. Make no mistake, we are the greater good.

I’m proud of the changes my team brought to the Clarion. During my time as editor-in-chief, the Clarion’s internal processes have become more transparent, we’ve improved our quality while cutting some staff positions as well as vastly expanded our online and digital presence. By no means can I claim to have achieved any of these things by myself, but rather they were achieved by others for the benefit of the Clarion. The Clarion engenders leadership from the DU student body.

The Clarion has taught me to hope and to embrace serenity in the face of insurmountable chaos. It has taught me that everything will work out, for the best, if one has the right perspective and outlook. It’s also taught me to hope and dream for the best and then to make these things a reality; the magic of the Clarion is that anyone can get involved and one day become its editor and see their policies, preferences and goals enacted.

I have a litany of people to thank.

It all starts with Sarah, my partner-in-crime and my friend through the good times and the terrible ones. In fall 2012, at an inconsequential dinner, she said, “Tonight is the first time of many next times.” And it was. I will never forget our Jerusalem dinners, our plotting sessions in Halls and or our legendary arguments over things that today seem so irrelevant. There will always be a pair of lightsabers for us to duel with and a bag of stale dum-dums in my room for you. I couldn’t have done this without you.

Lanna. Oh, Lanna. When I see you leading the Clarion team, planning for next year and in your element on Monday nights, I am more and more convinced that you will be the best editor-in-chief in recent Clarion memory. Your combination of practicality, efficiency and creativity make you an amazing, incomparable individual and will make you an excellent editor. I will always be here for you … professionally, of course. I have the immense privilege of knowing you outside of work, and from what I see in you every day, you instill in me a sense of peace about the future; with you, I know everything will not only be okay, but will thrive.

To Breanna, I didn’t get to work with you as much as I would have liked, but from what I’ve seen and from what I know, you’re going to excel in this post because that’s who you are. I’ve seen your frustration when a project, a page or a story isn’t perfect; use this to drive you forward and make this paper the greatest it can be.

To all those who were a part of the Clarion this year, thank you for shaping this formative experience for all of us. Meg, you’ve grown Entertainment into something of which we can all be proud. You and your team’s interviews with stars and your genuine care for the Clarion made it easy to be chipper and inspired on Monday nights. Kameryn and Camilla, you’re genuinely some of the coolest kids I ever had the privilege of knowing; you took a section that was already steeped in culture and class and managed to make it even more so. You make the Clarion fun, interesting and relevant to our readers and our staff. Carli, your newswriting savvy and editorial leadership helped ensure that News was an integral part of the campus conversation and the core of the Clarion. Calvin, I’m not sure how you came to the Clarion, but you managed to turn zero pitches and a handful of well-crafted stories into one of our strongest sections every week. Your demeanor and humor helped us all get through Mondays, even if you wouldn’t dance when 11 p.m. rolled around. Kaye, our commiserations over a “Song of Ice and Fire” have been fantastic. Not unlike Daenerys Targaryen, you’ve been the mother of dragons (or was it em dashes?) for the copy clan this year. Gusto, you’re a truly talented photographer who we were lucky to have on staff this year.

Chris, your Herculean work ethic ensured that Opinions, my baby, would endure as a powerhouse in the Clarion. Our charge to inform as well as to spark discussion was vastly broadened under your leadership. I wish our time could have been longer together.
Finally, the Clarion has instilled in me an abiding sense of perseverance. It’ll do that to anyone who happily trudges through 12 hours of work on a Monday night after a full schedule of classes. Though, without the love and hope, the perseverance would mean nothing; the hope of the Clarion inspires those who love it to work harder for the benefit of this century-old institution.

I’m no good at goodbyes, so I’ll let Shakespeare play me out, from “Julius Caesar,” V.i.

“O, that a man might know / The end of this day’s business ere it come! / But it sufficeth that the day will end, / And then the end is known.”