College Remorse

Funny title I know. Normally that sort of tone is paired with buyers, but for me its what I’’m really struggling with. Maybe you can relate to me when I descibe my little story……

You see it all started with a simple frustration.A frustration with the lack of choice. Choice in Christian Radio Stations around here in the Seattle/Tacoma region. We basically have one station that you & I would consider Christian. Mainly its one of those ""family friendly"" type stations that plays mostly contemporary music that (in my opinion mind you!) caters to mostly adults aged 30+.
Nothing wrong with that at all, adults need to have something to listen to. But as a teen, I got pretty tired of listening to the same songs over & over……songs that today nearly 11 years later are still being played over & over……Nothing wrong with this station, but doesn’’t provide what a more youthful crowd would be looking to listen too. And in the beautiful state of Washington, aka: the least church state in the US, we have little choice.
So I wanted more. I wanted to have something to choose from on the radio. I didn’’t want to listen to the ""secular"" stations that dominated the airwaves, but of course I did & still do. Those stations are fun. Have fun prizes, have great commercials, have funny morning shows, but best of all they have more music to listen too!!!I had it all planned out in my head about how a radio station would be working. What sort of age group we’’d cater too, what sort of music we’’d play, the stations logo, the stations bible verse––everything.
But then, I went to college and enrolled in Radio Broadcasting at my local Technical College. This was about 7 years after I graduated from High school so I was a little behind on the whole going to school thing.
Going back to school was great. I proved a lot to myself of what I could accomplish & what I still needed a little work on!
But quite possibly the worst thing was how my teacher, my only teacher for Radio, was a dream stealer & a dream crusher.He was a realist. He’’d obviously been hardened over time working at this college.
It was Very difficult to work with the man & even more difficult to learn anything from him. IT was a very, very hard 1.5 years that just ended with my graduation this June 2005.
Proud to have graduated? You bet.
I don’’t regret going to school or learning the things that I did.
But I have MAJOR college remorse.
You never really learn what your profession will be like until you get into it. Part of my schooling was to intern for 240 hours. So I interned at a smaller AM Christian station I had never heard of before. It was a talk station so that was probably why. They play mostly syndicated stuff (pre-recorded national shows) from people like Dobson, the Bible Answer Man, Focus on the Family, you know all the big heavies in the Christian world.
Anyway, I was an assistant to the producer of the only live show on the station Called Live from Seattle. So for nearly 5 months I worked with the station & learned a lot about my ""choosen profession.""It was very hard to leave that station. I loved the people I worked with, but leaving was also a good thing. I learned more then I think I would have ever learned at school in those months. I also learned that radio probably wasn’’t going to work for me in the region.Seattle is a big city as I’’m sure many of you might know. Jobs for me are basically limited to a board operator job. Which is another term for machine baby sitter.
sorry folks, hate to spoil it for you, but radio is mainly run by a big computer……

I had so many hopes, dreams & ideas for a radio station up here in WA that caters to the Youth. I’’ve always held a special place in my heart for the Youth & Young adults. I think that music speaks to many young people & that if they something to reach out to them like music then a lot more kids here would be curious about Christ.
Have I given up on my dream?
Well, yes & No.
I want so much to believe that one day a radio station will move into town that is exactly what I’’ve been working on in my head. I want to be the first one in line to help get that station going. But will I be working radio right now? I would if I could afford too.
All my training at school & those student loans looming in the background makes me feel sick when I think that maybe I made the wrong career move. I’’m not getting much younger to continue going to school & as it is I already did a vocational school so those credits mean little to any other sort of school. When people ask me how my job hunt is going & I tell them I’’m not really looking, its like a constant reminder that I failed in that area.

Oh I know, Failure is a tough word to use. But that is how I feel right now.What I would really like to do is have my own show syndicated one day. On what I don’’t know yet.
Am I saying I wanted to be some sort of great DJ?
Well its what I trained to be, but it wasn’’t my favorite thing to do.
I have to reteach myself that dreaming big is ok.
NO matter what some teacher says it shouldn’’t be bigger then what God says. I have to remind myself that I will do something one day in the field I trained in & I will actually like it!! Maybe for now its not the right time. For now, I need to get over how my teacher stole my dream with rules, regulations, a negative spirit, doubting attitude and his experience.
Besides, in the end it all has to be for God for anything I do to be really blessed. If I’’m out there doing this radio gig all to glorify me & to make me famous then it all was for nothing. I can’’t take that with me in the end anyway!
So that I where I’’m at today.
Its what I’’m struggling with now that people are figuring out I’’ve graduated.

If anyone out there is reading this & you might know of anything that might move into the Seattle/Tacoma Market, please leave a reply. Otherwise, if I could be so bold as to say for others––please pray for this region. Pray that something happens to this state in the Northwest that really brings people to church. I heard a statistic once that only 33% of people attend church on Sunday in WA. And that includes all religions––Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, Catholics, everyone. Isn’’t that sad?Its not just sad, its reality.