This issue of the Record features a lot of new writers who submitted work from several different upper-level communication courses. Not only am I extremely excited to share their pieces, but I’m also thrilled to increase the number and variety of writers in these pages.

But, I’ll be the first to admit that I like to work independently. I don’t like checking in with people and I’ve always disliked group projects. I can do it faster if I just do it myself is my usual response.

Well, turns out the Record is basically a massive, semester-long group project. Who knew.

I can send out as many emails as I want, but if nobody replies, the Record won’t happen. If nobody writes, the Record won’t happen. If nobody takes pictures or copy edits or designs layout, the Record simply wouldn’t make it to print.

So, when I was offered articles, really, really good articles, by members of several different comm classes, I was initially hesitant to accept them. Did that mean I couldn’t manage it on my own? I couldn’t find content, so these classes had to help me out? I had that thought for about .5 seconds, and then realized that was ridiculous.

People were offering to share their writing with me and to the entire community as well. What a gift! Say thank you, I thought.

Gratitude is something we have to cultivate, all the time, in every sense of the word. Saying thank you for the articles is a good start, but being grateful for a community of writers, friends, editors, designers and mentors that makes it possible for the Record to happen at all, or make it possible for me to do my job is just as important.

The Record wouldn’t be faster if I had no help, and if I were completely on my own, everything I did in my life would be worse off for it too. Accepting help or support doesn’t make any of us less competent as individuals. It means we’re in the middle of something greater than ourselves, and we can either be selfish and remain outside, or accept it and place ourselves in the wider circle.

Liz Gilbert writes, “In the end, maybe it’s wiser to surrender before the miraculous scope of human generosity and to just keep saying thank you, forever and sincerely, for as long as we have voices.”

I think it’s time we give up trying to keep track and pay back everyone and everything that has ever sustained or supported us, and commit to being grateful for these words, these people, these places. Accept it, extend it, and be grateful. And enjoy the new array of voices in this issue!