This puppy waving goodbye is essentially how I wish all goodbyes could be.

Let me start by apologizing for not posting nearly as much as I told myself I would. Once a week turned into about once a month. I know these goodbye posts are probably all going to be the same, unless I’m awkwardly the only one that posts one. So I want to make mine more of a thank you note to the Oklahoman and everyone here because I have more gratitude for them than I think they realize. So here we go:

Whenever I started high school, I had no idea journalism was something I wanted to pursue. I’m not going to complain and say I went to a poor and underprivileged high school, but I will say that the year I started high school, budget cuts were happening everywhere and one of its first victims was the school newspaper. So I never had that. I never got to have a moment where I wrote for a school paper, had a byline and realized my life calling.

But I did have Newsroom 101. During my sophomore year of high school someone gave me an application for Newsroom 101 and I thought it would be an interesting opportunity, so I filled out the application and sent it in to The Oklahoman the day it was due.

Being in Newsroom 101 opened my eyes to a world I never knew I was missing out on. For three years, I gave up sleeping in on Saturday mornings to drive out to The Oklahoman and be a part of Newsroom 101 and I loved every minute of it. I would not trade those Saturday mornings for anything. The Oklahoman made me fall in love with journalism.

I could talk up The Oklahoman until my face turns blue. I could go on and on about how invaluable Newsroom 101 has been to me and so many others. Aside from giving me great references and great mentors (Carrie, I owe so much to you and am so grateful that you gave up your Saturdays for us. It meant a lot to me.)

The Oklahoman’s impact on my life doesn’t end there. So let’s fast forward two years.

This was my first internship. For whatever reason, Joe took a chance on me. I hope he isn’t regretting it, because it’s a little late at this point.

For the past two months, I have had a fantastic time being an intern here. I got to talk to people and do things I would have never imagined. The amount of investment The Oklahoman puts into their interns really blows me away. This has been an unforgettable summer, and I owe about a thousand “thank you’s” to just about everyone here. The Oklahoman has felt like a home. It has been so welcoming, supportive and fun.

I fell in love with journalism all over again this summer, and I have The Oklahoman to thank for that.

Thank you!

— Conner Rohwer

P.S. I am really going to miss most of the interns. You guys were the icing on the cake.

I’m still waiting for this internship to feel like actual work.

Even though it’s barely been two weeks, I have already done some pretty cool things. But so far, week two is looking a lot better than week one. In the past two days I have been on Oklahoma’s only zip line tour and I’ve interveiwed jazz’ fastest growing star, Esperanza Spalding.

Esperanza Spalding came out of nowhere in 2011 and won the Grammy Award for best new artist. She beat Justin Bieber, Drake, Florence and the Machine and Mumford and Sons. She’s kind of awesome. Her music is beautiful.

Listen to my favorites. They are: Hold On Me, Black Gold and Vague Suspicions.

If Matt knew how easily I get startstruck, he might have second guessed giving me the story. One time I froze up completely when I met the host of a BYU-TV cooking show I was on in college. As if mormon cooking show hosts are famous.

Anyway, I didn’t make a complete fool of myself. I had a great conversation with her and found out some pretty cool things that I’ll probably never use for the article, but sometimes my curiousity gets the better of me.

Random kid on a zip line.

Today, I got to go out to a zip line they built just outside of Tulsa. I met some great people, had good interviews and I conquered my fear of heights. This thing was more than 50-feet off the ground, and they expect you to just step right off the platform and trust the harness won’t break and send you falling to your death*.

Originally, I was just going to get information because I didn’t have a camera with me, but they literally forced me into a harness against my will and made me walk to the top. OK, that didn’t happen. But it almost felt like it.

I don’t feel like this has been work. This internship has already given me some great memories and I can’t wait to make more this summer. I wasn’t about to pull my cell phone out and risk dropping it in the forest, so this is a random picture of a kid I found on the Internet. That might be creepy, but this is about what the forest looks like when you’re doing the tour.

*I know Joe had this fear for me, too, when Matt told me I would be doing this. I survived, though, and they put you through a quick training before you do the course.