Trajectory: Alexandra March ’10 | Department of Journalism

“It’s strange to think that I was worried about accidentally eating unpasteurized soft cheese a few months ago, and now I am writing my will and preparing for the worst case scenario (while hoping for the best, of course),” Alexandra March ’10 told us in April.

With her first child due in June, the self-described “type A, planner, worrier” is being forced to set aside her spreadsheets during a time that makes even type Cs consummate type As. “All this time I thought that the worst I would have to protect her from in the early days would be the common cold, and I would combat that by wiping off her tiny, ever-sticky hands, feeling like the most capable doctor in the nation’s best hospital. Now I realize that not only can I not prepare for her birth in a pandemic, but it’s also likely that a lot of her life will be beyond my protection. My spreadsheets will be useless. I’m forced to accept that I can’t plan for everything; I don’t have any choice but to be agile — no one knows what the world will look like in three months,” wrote March in The New York Times in April.

March doesn’t usually write for the Times — she works behind the bylines. As senior staff editor for the opinion section, she runs eight digital newsletters for the Times, including “Debatable,” with its opposing views on major topics. Her role encompasses a bit of everything for the opinion section’s digital realm, from co-running its Instagram with a colleague to working on push notifications, LinkedIn, Flipboard, and Apple News.