I Met With the Famous, the Cows, and Poison Oak as a News Reporter

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When I first started writing a weekly blog in 2021, I’d always wanted to write but had never gotten around to it. Then it crossed my mind, “Wait. You used to be a news reporter.”

Are you wondering how I could have forgotten I’d been a news reporter?

It makes sense if I tell you it took place back in the late 1980’s, a good thirty-plus years of memory ago. No, it wasn’t for The New York Times. Yes, it was for my college’s student newspaper at UC Davis. No, I didn’t get paid.

At first, I was a reporter, then a features writer for The California Aggie, and I’d rather not forget that again. I went online to gather what I’d written from the archive of photos of beige-colored newspaper articles. I was clear on what I wanted to know. What had I written? Would I be mortified?

As I read through the articles, though, a thought kept jumping from my mind: She’s so much like me.

Half of me knew her well, while the other half was eager to meet her. Sadly, I never will, but I do have some of her writing. Let’s look.

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First, I wrote about high-profile national events, such as National Condom Week. Yes, I reported on condoms.

An excerpt:

Davis celebrates National Condom Week

“For the past 10 years, students and health organizations across the country have promoted and celebrated one of the more basic inventions known to humans, the condom. Now in its 10th year, National Condom Week attempts to educate the public about the importance of using prophylactics.”

I like how I asserted that the condom was one of the more basic inventions known to humans. How did I know such a thing? Or was this an op-ed? We’ll never know.

UC Davis is the “Ag branch” of the University of California system. It has world-class programs in veterinary medicine and agricultural sciences. Therefore, of course, I wrote about the opportunity people had on Picnic Day to stick their hand into a cow’s fistula.

Yup. I was thinking the same thing → ???

Picnic Day began back in 1909 and, apparently, is one of the largest student-run events in the nation. It’s fun — so much to see and learn. A fistula, for the non-cow aficionados, is a surgically created opening in the cow’s side that accesses the cow’s digestive chamber. It’s used for research and transplanting healthy microbes between animals.

An excerpt:

Holy Cow! A “hands-in” experience

“How now brown cow…did you get that hole in your side?

"Take a jaunt over to the animal science department’s gala Picnic Day exhibit and find out. Among the myriad exhibits and activities organized by the department is an eyebrow-raising show, the fistulated cow exhibit. For all those interested, the opportunity to stick your plastic-gloved hand into the cow’s fistula will be afforded. You can imagine this display draws a crowd.

"Those who can’t stomach something quite so adventuresome might peer into the microscope displaying microorganisms from the rumen. Two cows will be used in this exhibit: one currently producing milk, the other a steer. They’ll take turns. It’s stressful to have your stomach handled all day, I’m sure.”

You can see I was sure about quite a bit back then, including the cow’s experience. Intuitive or not, it makes sense, I guess.

My reporting covered water ballet, an exhibit of 18th-century botanical drawings, a shout-out for student volunteer jurors for the law school, interviews with professors, a wildlife refuge grant, elephant poaching in Kenya, and an interview with someone I was starry-eyed about — Dave Scott.

Dave was the first six-time Ironman World Championship winner and first inductee into the Ironman Hall of Fame. He grew up in Davis, lived there, and I got to interview him. This was some time after that special day when I peeked through my swimming goggles underwater to see who was in the lane next to me at a public pool, when I sputtered through the water to myself, OMG. That’s Dave Scott! I don’t need to tell you who did more laps.

Then there was my immersive reporting experience with the university’s ROTC program, where I went along on their 3-day field training exercise at Fort Ord. It was run by the seniors for the underclassmen. I still remember that article because of the historic allergic reaction I developed to the poison oak we traipsed through all weekend long.

An excerpt:

California Aggie reporter goes to ROTC field training

“Saturday morning. Fort Ord, Monterey. 5:30 a.m. I crawl out of my tent in the clothes I’ve been wearing since last night. My goal: close simulation. I’m pretending I’m a reporter in the bush, here to report on the atrocities. I can only allow myself the luxury of brushing my teeth. Peeing in the bushes will be standard.”

“Well before my wake-up call, the cadets had dismantled their tents and turned them into the supply tent. Tonight they will take turns sleeping for an hour or so in their foxholes as they secure their defense positions around a 360-degree perimeter set around a hill west of here.”

The article goes on to describe the weekend’s activities and the meticulous approach the cadets took to their training, despite lack of sleep. I mused on this as I rode with them to a nearby water tower where they were to simulate a raid.

“Nobody said a word the entire ride. The cadets were tired. It was a welcome chance to sit down, I think. I wonder if it seemed as real to them. For the first time, I felt like an outsider. I realized I wasn’t being asked to do the work, to fight. Their tired faces and serious demeanor made me feel like just a lousy reporter. They were the ones on the line, the ones who would secure the water tower or not. The ones who were going to do the fighting. I felt an intense feeling of respect for them, mixed with sadness.”

Then, after I got home, the poison oak reaction sprouted. Everywhere.

Such is life as a serious news reporter.

Finally, the one I love the most, which I have no recollection of:

Kids say the darndest things

“A couple of weeks ago, Cindy Finley, a first-grade teacher at West Davis Elementary School, lent me five of her students. The kids showed me to the multipurpose room, where we sat down on the floor in the center. I explained, as they arranged themselves in a half-moon around me, that they were going to collectively author a Valentine’s Day story.

“Is it going to be a fake story?” Allain wanted to know. I said they could make up anything they’d like, but to remember it was a Valentine’s story. Basically, anything goes. There was some murmuring and squirming and some getting situated. Then the storytelling began.

Allain established the setting and characters. We might call it this: The Adventures of the Heart Family.

“Once upon a time, four hearts, they live in a house next to a sea bank and they ate porridge for breakfast.”

So, they live in a stress-free environment and eat grains. Nice.

Ryan continues. “They ate breakfast and then they went outside and went for a swim in the water."

The cardiologist would be proud — grains and exercise.

OK, Shabnam, your turn.

“Uh-oh. What was the story again?”

I recap as Shabnam considers. “And then after they took a swim in the water, they got out of the water, and then they went to take a walk.”

I ask her what happens during the walk, maybe.

“They tripped over a rock.”

Candice gives us her input. “They got up and went on. They saw another heart, and then they asked it to live with them.”

What a family of hearts; health-conscious and communal.

You’re up, Amanda.

“And when they were on their walk, they dug up clams, and when they came home, they made a big clam chowder and a big cake, and then they celebrated Happy Valentine’s.”

Now, for Adventure Two. Amanda begins this time.

“Once there was two hairy monsters and they lived together in a big cave. And then they went for a walk, and they scared a whole bunch of fish.”

No shortage of walking here.

“And then there was some spiders and the monsters scared them away,” Candice says.

“And then the monsters found some hearts and then the hearts scared the monsters away. And the hearts got so happy they had a holiday. And they called it Valentine’s,” Shabnam relates.

Ryan goes into detail. “And after Valentine’s, they ate dinner. And they had spaghetti and meatballs, and then they had dessert, which was chocolate ice cream. Then they went to bed, and they woke up at three o’clock in the morning.”

I should say so, after eating all that.

“And then they woke up at three in the morning,” Allain continues, “and they took a walk in the woods, and they played some games and stuff.”

The End

Boy, that Heart family. They really get around.”

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What is odd to me is that this reporter is me, yet she isn’t. She sounds like me, but she’s so far away I can barely see her. 

Maybe that’s how it goes. Our past selves live on in lessons learned and knowledge built, but it’s only through an archive of articles or letters that we can touch them. I have questions for her, and no doubt she has them for me. What would she ask? I’ll never know. What would I answer? That’s for another story.

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Have a lovely rest of your week, friends.