“The West Wing” has been my comfort show for as long as I can remember. The series is famous for its use of the “walk and talk” technique. Two White House staffers weave through hallways while simultaneously debating policy, trading witty remarks, and leafing through documents. As the camera tracks the characters’ path through a bustling workplace, it conveys the effect of perpetual motion. Life, “The West Wing” implies, moves too fast for you to stand still. Figure it out as you go.
My time at The Daily Pennsylvanian was an education in how to walk and talk. Reporting and editing for a student newspaper requires you to do two — or more often twenty — things at once. The cost of that coordination can be steep, measured in hours of lost sleep, assignment extensions, and a Pavlovian response to the Slack ping sound. So why did I find it so compelling? It’s only as a senior, with some breathing room from the DP’s breakneck pace, that I finally figured out the answer.
When I arrived at Penn, I had no intention of joining the student newspaper. I applied to DP News on a whim, based on the simple fact that I liked to write. As an English major, the writing and editing process spoke to my love for words. As a Penn student, reporting answered my intrinsic curiosity about how the University and its institutions really worked.
A year later, I stepped into the role of assignments editor. My role entailed being a mentor and advocate for new reporters (“GAs,” as we call them). I loved everything about the position, but its demands introduced a new layer of complexity to my life. My daily schedule often felt like proof of the adage that multitasking is a myth. The camera was moving on without me, and all I could do was try to stay in the frame.
Unprecedented campus turmoil starting in December 2023 put my ability to adapt to the test. Voices called for my attention from every direction. That included singing at Carnegie Hall with the Penn Glee Club on Friday night, then dashing to the office the next day due the resignation of former Penn President Liz Magill. It meant ducking out of an English seminar to take phone calls from elusive sources, and juggling a 24/7 breaking news cycle with four final papers. As my term continued, I gained confidence in my ability to figure it out on the fly.
During the whirlwind of print production night, I sometimes found a moment to pause and just absorb my surroundings. I would stare up at the newspapers plastered on the Blue Room walls and the improbability of it all would hit me. The stubborn passion that motivates students to voluntarily spend five nights a week in a windowless office. The satisfaction of transforming a color-coded spreadsheet into a print issue in a single evening, thanks to the combined efforts of dozens of people. The joy of witnessing a GA reporter grow from a timid first year to a confident reporter over the course of a semester.
Caught up in the flurry of student journalism, it can be tempting to focus on your own momentum. Am I moving too slowly? Is there more to say or write? Where am I heading next? It’s easy to forget the basic premise of “The West Wing”’s hallmark technique: you can’t walk and talk alone. During my time at the Pink Palace, my path briefly aligned with that of people I would never have met otherwise.
Here’s what I’ve figured out: the walk and talk is so captivating because of its sheer unlikeliness. What are the chances that this diverse group of people, at this particular point in time, happen to share a trajectory? And yet, for an entire year, the DP staff did. Not only that. We — the pre-meds and the political science majors, the artistically talented and the academia-bound — pushed through uncertainty and exhaustion to produce a newspaper we could be proud of.
I’m grateful to have shared hallways with people who were deeply kind and hardworking. The list includes my predecessor Saya, my fellow “News140” editors Ben and Katie, and my two GA classes. But it also extends to all the people with whom I’ve co-bylined, exchanged 3 a.m. Slack messages, or split Prod Night cinnamon rolls. You have made me a better writer, editor, leader, and friend.
Ahead of graduation, I’ve had countless conversations with other seniors about what comes next. Even as the next doorway calls, I’ve just been trying to soak up in my last few days at Penn. I appreciate the person next to me in the present, whether we are sitting in the last seminar of my undergraduate career, trekking through the high rise wind tunnel, or singing side-by-side at a concert. I look at them and think: What an honor it is to walk and talk alongside you, even if only for a moment.
ELLA SOHN is a College senior studying English, Legal Studies & History, and French & Francophone Studies, from Portland, OR. She served as DP assignments editor on the 140th Board of The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc. Her email is elsohn@sas.upenn.edu.
