Odyssey sucks. It just does.

It exploits writers by making them work for free, and pays Editors-in-Chief the bare minimum to keep them working their behinds off 24/7. Seriously, being an EIC is an exhausting, thankless job. Trust me. Not to mention, they share ridiculous clickbait posts on their social media that take no talent to create, while ignoring thousands of actual thoughtful, well-written pieces. And Odyssey HQ is impossible to reach most of the time, leaving EICs, CEs, and creators to fend for themselves, all while HQ profits.

Yes, Odyssey infuriates me. And I've written about it more than once. I've been with Odyssey for well over a year now, and things have only gotten worse.

So, why am I still here?

First of all, I ask myself that every day. Second of all, there's a couple of reasons.

Well, it's a great resume item, especially if you're an EIC. On your resume and in interviews, you can talk all day long about how you managed 30+ people, met deadlines, set goals, crushed them, implemented team strategies, and so on. Boom. You now can say you have managerial experience. You can use your friends on the team as actual, legitimate work references. You can even use your EIC as a coveted supervisor reference. I, personally, enjoy the ability to share my thoughts, express myself, and especially, piss off Republicans. It's really all worth it for that last bit.

So there's all of that. However, there are three big reasons why I stay at Odyssey. There are three priceless gifts that Odyssey has personally handed to me that I could never thank it properly for.

Those gifts have names, and they are Kiandra, Renata, and Rylie.

These are (and I say this with all of the love and affection in the world) my bitches. We've never all been in the same place at the same time. We hardly ever see each other IRL. But they are easily the most ride-or-die friends I have. They are, dare I say... my Squadessey. (Disgusting, but that's the actual name of our Snapchat group.)

Whenever one of us has a bad day (or a bad week... or a bad year...) we are all there to rush to their rescue. No matter the occasion, we are always there to hype each other up, to remind each other that we are all bad ass bitches that deserve the world, to lend a helping hand, to listen to (sometimes illogical) rants, to love each other unconditionally, to make each other laugh, and to FaceTime for no reason at all.

I would never have met any of these strong and beautiful ladies had it not been for (sigh) Odyssey. We all live in completely different places, half of us in different states, even. But when we FaceTime or when we finally meet up IRL, it's nothing but love and constant laughing. Rylie and I literally go to bed at 9:00 PM every night, but when we're together, we die over any and everything until 3:00 AM. It's psychotic.

I know that I could count on any one of these three for anything if I ever needed it, and they would be there. Nobody else in the world makes me laugh as hard as these girls do. Really. We've laughed for weeks about a fucking typo, before.

I am so blessed that I can call these three angels my best friends. They make the hell that is Odyssey a little more bearable and a lot more fun. I am thankful for all three of you every day. xoxo

So if you're hesitant about joining Odyssey... good. You should be. It's a lot of work for little to no pay, no reward, no acknowledgement (unless you like to write bullshit). I can't promise you that you'll gain viral fame, that you'll get valuable writing experience, or even that you'll have a good time. All I can tell you is that it gave me my very best friends on this earth, and I would go through all the hell of Odyssey 1,000 times over again for them. If you join Odyssey, you might hate your life, you might get threatened on Facebook by angry Republicans, and you might quit after a week. But you might also meet your Kiandra, your Renata, or your Rylie. And that, I can promise you, is worth it.