Sept. 11, 2001- I was just a kid

By the time August 2001 rolled around, I needed a full-time job and some cash. Post-college. I had been doing part-time sports work for the one of the country’s greatest newspapers, The Washington Post, for a year. I did whatever they asked: answer phones, gather sports agate, cover high school sports, write notebook roundups and minor league baseball games. I was so enamored with the place that I would do anything they asked. The Post’s motto to aspiring reporters there was simple: go away, prove yourself at a couple of papers and come back. In order to become the men and women I idolized at The Post, I had to leave. So, in early August, I took a high school sports writing job with The Columbia Flier/Howard County Times, one of the most respected weekly newspapers in Maryland. Getting paid to go write about football, basketball and baseball games was a dream of mine and I loved the atmosphere surrounding high school sports. When I started my job,