It’s hard to believe that three years ago last week I made my very first post on Concrete Loop. Since then, I’ve made 1,128 more; boy, time certainly flies when you’re having fun.

I’ll never forget the day I got Angel’s email asking me to come on board and cover politics in preparation for the 2008 election. It was in my senior senior year of college (I had two since I had to medically withdraw and retake all my classes from a previous year), and I was still trying to figure out what I wanted to do for a living.

Would I go on to law school? I had long decided I didn’t want to practice law although it had been a childhood dream; I figured I could do something with a law degree, but why waste the time, energy and money if my heart wasn’t completely in it? Maybe I’d work on an MBA…or better yet, get a master’s in education. Since I had spent so much time volunteering at local elementary schools following a single course in education, I just knew I wanted to be a teacher. But having spent six years in college (on top of high school), I wasn’t ready for more schooling.

That’s why Concrete Loop came along right on time.

My first posts were strictly political: I kept you in the loop on the caucuses and primaries and even compiled a voting guide, since many of our readers would be first-time voters. I added news to my repertoire, and within a month of starting the job, I was writing a social commentary column, J. Dakar On. It was around this time the mud-eating situation in Haiti hit the American press, and our post helped spark record donations to one of the nation’s top non-profits. That’s among one of my proudest moments.

Then things really started heating up in the political arena, and I’ll never forget the Hillary Clinton post. In my failed attempt at a little humor in the introduction, readers mistook me for a staunch Obama supporter although I made every attempt to conceal my political leanings. Looking back, I now realize my introduction kinda gave it away, but it was at that point I realized the importance of what I presented to the masses and how I did so.

And then came the victory.

Regardless of whether you agree with him, the Obama presidency did so much for so many when you think of all the years black and brown parents alike have told their kids they could one day be president.

Two of the few regrets I have in my life are not taking a job on the Obama campaign (although in retrospect, it’s probably best I didn’t) and not attending the inauguration, although I did take the day off to watch it (at the time, I was working for a Fortune 500 company in insurance/financial services).

After that, much of my political coverage languished (just like I said it would), focusing a bit more on the Obama White House than Obama’s policy except for the major points, of course. By this time, I had begun covering a wide spectrum of topics, including pieces on suicide and mental health in the black community. I had also taken on compiling the black history spotlights (60 to date), in addition to album and book reviews as well as interviews.

Things weren’t always of a lighter nature, though.

The Derrion Albert post still brings tears to my eyes, having watched the video of the savage beating in its entirety before we removed it. And I have such a hard time writing missing persons posts, but I think, “What if this was someone I knew and loved?” I would want everyone doing everything they could to find them, so I do. Plus, “mainstream media” often neglects to mention those who don’t happen to be rich and white or perhaps not as much.

That’s quite unfortunate, but it’s also a part of what helps motivate me to do what I do; if I don’t, then who will?

That thinking, I’m sure, helped earn an invitation to the White House late last year. Words can’t describe the feeling I had meeting President Obama; when I became the political contributor at Concrete Loop, it never even crossed my mind that I might one day meet the man.

Maybe I’ve come full circle; I say the best is yet to come.

♫ Post Title Soundtrack: Frank Sinatra — “The Best Is Yet to Come”