Bravery and cowardice.

A few months ago three of my stories were picked as finalists at the LA Press Club Awards. My former boss, the wealthy publisher of the site, did not seem to feel awkward about the fact that she’d fired me the prior year and invited me to attend the ceremony.

My parents live in LA and I was due for a visit. I have a fancy red dress that’s too nice to wear anywhere except for in my room when I dance around and pretend I’m a princess which is why I nearly killed my mother when she noticed my ballgown, never worn out, was splattered in stains. Anyway! The Korean family that runs the dry cleaners saved the day. I had the most nominations of anyone at the site. I would be a hot, walking, red, “You’re glad you fired me, bitch?” (don’t worry she’s encased in an impenetrible bubble of rich person shamelessness).

I don’t like to drive in Los Angeles and also fully planned to get loaded, a plan felled when a glass of wine would turn out to cost $20 and my boss did not offer to get my tab, so I asked my Mom to drop me off. “Mommmm!” I hissed as we neared the Cecil Hotel.. “Drop me off here I don’t want people to see you!”

I walked in the the Cecil posing as an adult and found the group’s table. “How’s your son doing,” I pretended to care to ask the lady. “Good good” she said.

Tl:Dr: I got one award. It was annoying because they had submited one of my stories in the “group blog” section, even though the nomination was for my story alone; to fit that category they had to submit the names of two male staffers who had literally nothing to do with the story, one of whom I’m pretty sure had stabbed me in the back and helped get me fired ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Oh well! I had an award. I was now an “award-winning journalist.” My Dad, who’s an engineer and has no idea what I’ve been doing for two decades, was super proud and excited. Pretty sure he’d scoped out a spot for the trophy on the shelf, optimized for the time-honored immigrant tradition of “Oh. Your daughter. Is she an award-winning journalist? Hmmm?”

But then, I went to have a quick smoke and my boss took my trophy and left, claiming they’d looked for me and assumed I’d left. She said she’d pay to order another one to send to my parents, but never did ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Anyway, after our finalist section was over, I could relax, playing with my trophy (temporarily) and the flower I’d received, for the rest of the ceremony. I considered whether I could justify a $20 wine, decided yes—I was an “award-winning journalist” for Heaven’s sake—and begged God that the aspiring actor at the bar would hook me up with a good pour.

As I sat there, I started to feel gross. The theme of the ceremony was the bravery of journalists. But not a single speaker mentioned the Palestinian journalists who are dead men and women walking but keep reporting because there’s no one else to do it.

It recently occurred to me that they’d be safer without their PRESS jackets, because at this point no one can pretend the IDF is not targeting them, but they still wear them. I presume it’s so their final piece of journalism is a picture of their corpse in a PRESS jacket. Let’s let that sink in. I continued feeling grosser and grosser in my Princess Ball Gown.

The headline speaker was the father of Daniel Pearl, executed in Pakistan while reporting in 2002. He understandably talked about his son’s bravery. He did not talk about the Palestinian journalists. Earlier I’d made friends with his assistant. I approached him after the speech. “Hey dude. I want to ask Mr. Pearl about the Palestinian journalists.”

“No please please don’t. It’s not the time or place!” he said frantically.

But the actor behind the bar had indeed given me a generous pour of liquid courage and I approached Mr. Pearl, who’s some intimidatingly famous genius physicist and humanitarian, it would turn out. “Mr. Pearl!? Mr. Pearl!?” I Valley Girl up-talk screeched.

“I just wanted to ask you. Your son was so, so brave and you should be so proud. But don’t you think it’s strange that no one here is talking about Palestinian journalists? At an event celebrating brave journalists?”

We talked for a few minutes. He was nice and engaged. I honestly don’t remember what we talked about or ended on because I was both nervous and drunk. But we did take photos. And, afterward his assistant emailed me and said that Mr. Pearl had enjoyed our exchange, and that it had made him think, and that he didn’t like that everyone always flatters him instead of challenging his beliefs—as a man of knowledge this is aneathma to him.

I was pretty proud of myself. But now I’m ashamed of myself.

I should have refused the award.

I should have stormed the podium.

I should have broken my trophy before my boss had a chance to steal it.

I should have thought about wearing a fucking watermelon pin on my Fancy Ball Gown.

I didn’t do any of these things, or anything. I’m not beating myself up, I’m just not built for making a scene, consider myself a reporter more than an activist, and the whole awards was overwhelming. And it was over and I was in an Uber without my trophy before it hit me that no one, in conversation or in their speeches, mentioned the Palestinian journalists.

If there were some way to give it back I would though.