Fall 2009

I started college in September. Terrified was an understatement. I had decided ahead of time that I would major in Sport Management and minor in Journalism. I wanted to be a sports writer. My dream was to be an anchor for ESPN.
In my first major course, Seminar in Sport Management, we got to see every aspect of the sporting world in little snippets, one to two weeks per subject. I became rather intrigued by public relations. Towards the end of the semester (which was when I really started following the Capitals), we were required to write a paper in which we interview the person in the professional sporting world who had out “dream job.” I knew it would be an employee of the Nationals, Capitals, or Redskins, but had no idea where to start. Looking through the front office staffs (and deciding my newfound love for hockey trumped football or baseball) I found Nate Ewell. He was the Senior Director of Media Relations for the Washington Capitals and I thought that was the coolest job Ever.
Apparently, all you have to do is talk to one of the polite receptionists and they’ll transfer you right on through, which was a lot easier than I imagined. I spoke to him on a Tuesday and set up an interview for noon that following Thursday. It was extremely interesting to learn all about him and his job. That interview earned me a 100 and a newfound career path.

Spring 2009

To explain this endeavor, I have to start at the beginning. When I come to the end, I’ll stop.

In March of 2009, I woke up on a Saturday morning (er, early afternoon probably) to find my mother and grandmother standing about a foot away from our television. [This, in itself, is an interesting fact because it's 42 inches. If you miss something, you’re crazy!]
They explained that a hockey game was on television and that my cousins and uncle (who live in Virginia) were at the game. He had called and explained where they were sitting, so the two of them were pausing, rewinding, and fast-forwarding the game to try and find the tops of three blonde heads.
At the time, I hated hockey. I can’t tell you why, but I thought it was a stupid sport. I sat there and snickered as they did this. I must admit, their frustration was rather entertaining. After a while, I started to focus on the action, what was going on in this game. It was more entertaining.
I finally asked them to stop because if they hadn’t seen them yet (it had been about 30 minutes) they wouldn’t. I was being selfish though. I just wanted to watch. I decided to follow the team through the remainder of the season. Each game made me like them/hockey a little more.
Needless to say, the Washington Capitals were playing. Though I couldn’t tell you the name of a single player in the NHL, none the less on the team, I soon grew extremely fond of hockey and the Capitals.