Writing Samples

Below are PDF versions of some of my published work.

Bag Lady: 417 Magazine, October 2008

A profile on a local inventor. 

Great inventors have vision and inspiration, but most of them don’t discover it in a trash can. Beth Beam did one day in the summer of 2006, in the form of an ugly, oversized bathroom trash bag. Click here for full story. Page 2.

 

Evolution of Equality: 2009 Oklahoma Visitor Guide 

 A look at 30 years of OU women’s athletics.

Jackie Farley remembers when all female athletes shared a couple of coaches and the same OU uniforms. She remembers what male coaches said to her and her teammates in 1974, how some called women’s collegiate sports “ridiculous.” She talks about how she went out for and made the first OU women’s basketball team at 5-feet-6-inches and ended up one of the tallest on the team. She says most of her teammates had never played full-court basketball. But Farley also says that none of that really mattered then, either. Click here for full story. Page 2.

 Longar Longar: Sooner 2008

A profile on one of OU basketball’s starting seniors.

Longar Longar tells the kind of story great sports movies are made of. He was a lanky 6-foot-5-inch teen with an ambition to play in the NBA, but he had no game at all. He was one of 11 children in a close-kin family who wanted his dad to see him achieve that goal someday, but at 15, Longar lost his father. Grieving, he found his peace alone on an outdoor basketball court in Rochester, Minn. Click here for full story. Page 2.

A Smaller Spotlight: 2008 Oklahoma Visitor Guide. 

A story about lesser known athletics at the University of Oklahoma

Countless trophies, conference title plaques and All-American honors decorate the display cases in the lobby of OU’s Sam Vierson Gymnastics Center. Opposite the memorabilia behind a glass viewing area, a group of gymnasts goes through a casual off-season workout. No privacy fences shield this team from observers, and no media or security guards are here to scrutinize this practice. But when the season rolls around in late fall, the men’s gymnastics team will challenge for its fourth national title in six years. Despite their success, the gymnasts have graced few front pages outside of the gymnastics world, and many on campus couldn’t pick the NCAA all-around champion out of a crowd as he makes his way across campus. Click here for full story.

Guillermo Morales Profile: 2007 Sower. 

A profile on an incoming freshman for the new-to-OU magazine.

Four years ago, Guillermo Morales was sporting two ponytails and roaming the streets of southern Oklahoma City looking for trouble. Out of his gang of 30 friends, only two would graduate high school. Guillermo, also known as Willie, was one of them. Click here for full story

 

Reaching New Heights, Sooner 2008

Short season reviews of the OU men’s and women’s gymnastics team for Sooner yearbook.

They called it Soonergy, but the result of a season under this principle was a word anyone could understand: undefeated. Stemming from a word of the week game initiated by women’s gymnastics head coach K.J. Kindler, Soonergy represented a perfect combination of focus and cohesion for the gymnastics team. Click here for full story.

Cheers, 2007 Sooner

A feature story on a local Norman favorite for Sooner yearbook.

Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. For many OU students, that place is O’Connell’s Irish Pub and Grille. Located away from the chaos that is Campus Corner and situated conveniently across from the Gaylord Family-Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, O’Connell’s has become a place where students, locals and visitors alike go to feel right at home. Click here for full story