A year and a half ago, I didn’t even know what AP style was.

I was dazed and confused, changing my major four times from biology to religious studies to human dimensions of organization to journalism. But when I finally became a wannabe journalist — the type of journalist I wanted to be when I was 10 years old — everything became a fever dream.

Sports have always been a part of my earthly identity. Like many of us, they’ve been the untouchables: the things that make the bad days better and the hard days easier. They’ve mended fights, they’ve made a stranger a friend, they’ve been conversation starters and unifiers.

If you asked me at what specific moment I fell in love with sports journalism, I couldn’t tell you. But what I could do is take you back to Jan. 13, 2020 when the LSU Tigers beat the Clemson Tigers in the CFP National Championship. When the play clock hit triple zeros and the confetti fell from the top of the then-Mercedes-Benz Superdome, tears filled my eyes as I stood beside my best friend, my dad, witnessing the team we’d followed for 15 years win a national title. It was truly one of the best moments of my life.

I realized right then and there that it would be rather stupid of me not to pursue what I love, even if that meant covering a subpar Texas football team and exceptional Texas beats that were not all about the Tigers in purple and gold.

Flash forward six months: I’m interviewing for a Daily Texan position with absolutely no experience, just a whole lot of ambition and passion and grit. I was quickly humbled, taught and mentored through multiple sports beat positions and a Double Coverage editor position, and I wouldn’t trade any bit of this past year and a half for the world.

To Myah Taylor, Nathan Han, Stephen Wagner, Matthew Boncosky, Daniela Perez, Carter Yates and many more, thank you for your grace, words of wisdom and patience. I am genuinely so thankful for each of your friendships, and I’ll always cherish them more than I’ll ever cherish any byline I’ve ever had.

To my Double Coverage production staff and the entire sports department, I’m sorry that I never entered the basement, not even once.

Some things change. Dreams mold and change and sometimes die. And while I’m not too sure what I want to be when I grow up –– and while I may never know –– what I do know is that I’ll always have sports. The untouchables, the conversation starters, the unifiers and the menders, the relationship builders and the friendship creators. And that’s the good stuff, that’s what life is really all about.