It took me 30 minutes to write this sentence. I labored over the word choice.  The tone. The angle.

Vivid language is constantly at odds with word counts and breaking news urgency at the New York Times Student Journalism Institute. And as a magazine-bred reporter, cutting copy feels like a prison shank — quick and dirty.

You learn early on that the newsroom is full of compromises. Cancel an interview to make deadline. Truncate a lede for an additional quote. Phone interviews instead of on-site. Folgers over Starbucks. Content over sanity, sleep or sustenance. Decisions. Life choices.

OK, I lied. It took me 35 minutes to write that sentence. And since the clincher, like the lede, is equally taxing, I’ll just end this with —

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