One of the all-time greatest Cubs pitchers once blew me off for an interview. Before you get too excited, it was Kerry Wood, not Jake Arrieta.

Well, I blew off Kerry Wood, then he blew me off. Through many calls and many emails I was able to schedule an interview with him during my SRT. It wasn’t until the night before the interview I realized it was a late arrival, and instead of receiving the call during my SRT, it would be at the beginning of English.

I was taking a reading quiz with one hand on my phone and the other hand half-heartedly filling in what I later found to be mostly incorrect answers. I felt a buzz, ran up to turn in the quiz, asked to go to the bathroom in an urgent and “Yes, it’s an emergency” tone and answered the call just outside the room.

I thanked him for calling me and asked if he could call the next day. He said yes, and I naively believed him.

The next day I sat in the hallway outside the Torch room for two hours getting blown off by Kerry Wood.

Pages 10 and 11 contain stories about what it means to be a high school journalist. We do more than some may think.

Being a high school journalist means being a journalist. We don’t do this for a grade, and we don’t do this because we think it looks good on a college application. We do this for the students and the staff of Glenbrook North, and we do this for ourselves.

We want to tell stories about important things at GBN, and we want them to be good. We take pride in what we publish, not because we will get a better grade because of it, but because we take pride in ourselves, everyone who has been a part of Torch before us and everyone who will inherit it after us.

We work too hard for this to be for a grade. If it was only for an A, we would have all quit by now.

Back to the Kerry Wood story. My article was about Tommy John surgery, so I had to find someone who had it. I was upset about Kerry Wood, but I remembered my uncanny and seemingly magical talent for contacting people who have had Tommy John surgery. I interviewed Tommy John that night. A while later, Kerry Wood kindly apologized in an email and offered another time for an interview, but it was too late.

That article was published in the November issue last school year. As always on the day of distribution, the floors of the SA Hall and the SAC were littered with Torches. Before 2-3, I picked up most of them and threw them in the garbage.

It didn’t feel good, but I got over it.

We all had different reasons for joining Torch, but three years later, we all came out journalists of the highest professional standards.

I’ll believe those Torches on the floors were read first. I’ll believe people read my story about Tommy John surgery and maybe thought twice about the dangers of youth sports.

I’ll believe I’ve made a few people laugh with the columns I’ve written the past couple years. I’ll believe I’ve changed a few minds with the editorials I’ve contributed to this year. I’ll believe the students and staff of GBN appreciate what we write for them once a month.

I know we have appreciated writing it.