As I watch the end of yet another lovely semester come to a close, I can’t help but feel a little sentimental and misty-eyed about the past year. It’s almost enough to make you want to cry.

I thought about writing one of those end of the semester columns where I give a bunch of shout-outs and kick a lot of props out to all my homies. But I decided not to. After all, do I look like Chad Calek or something?

I mean it would be really easy for me to sit here and say thanks to all of those people who helped make my first year at the Daily so much fun. I could spend hours upon hours and inches and inches of column space with that sort of rigamaroll.

I don’t have to sit here and tell Chris Miller that I learned a lot from him and thanks for all his help. Do I really have to congratulate Corey Moss and Kris Fettkether (my first student in the school of perpetual coolness) for running an outstanding lifestyles desk? I don’t think so.

It would take entirely too much time to thank Tim Frerking and Kessia Wirt for all their help and encouragement and to congratulate them on their excellent jobs. To tell Chad Calek, my McDonald’s groupie, and Brandon “how come they put my name in the paper” Belisle that the sports coverage was excellent this year would be rather time consuming. Considering that I don’t have much time for that, I’m not gonna do it.

I was thinking of giving mad photo taking props to Andrea Melendez, Mike King and Mike Faas and all the crazy, fresh, skilled, incredible photo people for all their incredible work this year. But who really cares?

I could tell Tracy D. (couldn’t remember how to spell it) that she was a great editor this semester and helped to keep energy in the newsroom. But I don’t have the space for it.

I thought about thanking John Mullen for all of his assistance and allowing me to say the things that I say. And I thought about giving a big WAZZUP! to Scott “Cy-Ride” Jacobson, the master of nonverbal communication in the news room.

I was even gonna give incredible shouts out to all my fellow reporter people like Abby, Tara, Jason, Luke, Holly, Carolyn, Traci and everybody, we kicked much ass this year, even that Emily McNeil person did a good job too.

But since I’m kinda pressed for space and time I’m not gonna say anything about the great time I had this year at the Daily.

So instead I will talk about some different things like Iowa State and the learning that has been done this year. What have we learned? Maybe we learned that life isn’t all peaches and cream. We learned that things happen, things get said and people get pissed.

We learned that a lot of people take things way too seriously. We learned that if you say hooters in a column, you must be aspiring to be the next Larry Flynt.

We learned that we shouldn’t print public information since it is nobody’s business. We learned that if an ISU basketball player being held by police curses like three drunken sailors in a low class whorehouse, it’s the Daily’s fault for printing the transcript.

We learned that most people have no idea what it means to be a journalist. We have been taught that working for and putting out a newspaper is a sin right up there with swearing in church. We learned that when you do your job by reporting a murder, you are no better than the murderers themselves. We have learned that a lot of Iowa Staters are more concerned with the reputation of their fraternity. We have learned that being hated by members of the public comes with the job.

Iowa State has learned that the Daily is a major artery of this campus. ISU has learned that the Daily may be a group of students, but it is a group of damn fine students. The rest of ISU has learned that it can complain and dis and verbally shit on the Daily all it wants to, but every week, five times a week, the paper still comes out. Each day it is as good as the day before. We may be just a group of students, but we do our job the only way we know how — well!

I’ve even done some learning. I know it’s cool not to see eye to eye with everyone. I’ve learned that you can reverse the irreversible, and I’ve learned that Iowa will be Iowa.

So I’m gonna go eat some fried chicken, collard greens and black eye peas (can’t mess wit no chit’lins) and wash it down with some watermelon Kool-Aid while I watch a movie that shows as many hooters as I can find.

If you need me, I’ll be licking my fingers over here.

Later!

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Rhaason Mitchell is a junior in journalism and mass communication from Chicago.