Ever since I was a kid, I’ve loved telling stories.
Telling stories helps me connect with others, make people laugh and occasionally teach them, and me, something new.
Sharing fun facts is something my dad and I bond over every time we drive on the I-15 and he asks me if I know where McDonald’s was founded — yes, Dad, I do, it was in San Bernadino.
Whenever I call my little sister, I try to tell her about my day in the funniest way possible to make her laugh.
When I’m home on break, I can be found in my mom’s office, updating her on anything and everything that crosses my mind.
It is intrinsic to humans to convey information about our lives — telling our stories.
Human beings have been telling these stories for millennia — whether they come in the form of paintings in a cave, graffiti on the walls of Pompeii, or love letters from American artists, sharing information helped people connect in the present and left messages for those looking back from the future.
Sharing stories is so pivotal to the human experience that NASA sent information about life on Earth along on deep-space voyages.
In my four years at Pepperdine, I have been so extremely lucky to have storytelling as my major.
Journalism looks a little different from the fairytales I wrote in my journal as an elementary schooler, but it’s the same in the ways that matter.
Instead of dreaming up characters, I speak to sources. I replace plotlines with the day-to-day actions of my peers, teachers and community members.
Drawings hastily scribbled in the margins of a notebook have been replaced with the amazing designs and photography you see in this magazine before you.
Either way, there is a story to be told, and I hope you find it in these pages.
I’m not alone in telling these stories, the amazing people of Currents Magazine have stories to share — through their reporting, photography and design.
When I pitched this magazine, I wanted it and its stories to be snippets of our lives. What food did we eat, what cars did we drive, what games did we play, what books did we read and what did we tell ourselves to keep going?
Every single person in this world has an amazing story to tell, and this magazine barely scratches the surface of the countless stories waiting to be told at Pepperdine and the surrounding community. I hope flipping through it encourages you to find stories in both the mundane and the extraordinary.
I hope you use storytelling as a way to connect with the people you love and forge new relationships.
I hope you see yourself, and the people you love, in these stories — I know I do.
Happy storytelling.
– Sam
