Some days at the newspaper are more memorable than others. This past week was full of those days.
There are few moments in my life I can genuinely say I have been speechless. This past week was full of those moments.
I wrote last week, at the end of my column, about how unbelievably kind people can be. This week I was blown away.
I walked into a local business and multiple people stopped what they were doing to come tell me what an outstanding job I do at the paper. More than a few people stopped into the paper to tell me how they felt in person. More than one person cried as they expressed themselves. One person felt so moved that he pulled out his wallet and paid for ten years worth of subscriptions.
Thank you.
There are, often, times I get emotional as I write. It’s therapeutic for me. There are a lot of articles and columns I’ve written that no one has ever seen. And there are quite a handful that only Melanie, our chief reporter, (or lead singer as Reed said years ago) has read.
I was in city hall last week. I had to talk to SaraJo about a story and she said I work harder than anyone in their twenties that she knows. This isn’t the only time I’ve heard this. She also mentioned that not many people would do for the paper, or my father, what I have done. I sometimes wonder if people forget that this stuff is also important to me— like not taking over for my father was ever really an option.
There was a time, and still are times in my life I think about doing something else other than running the paper. I went to college for a year. Granted, almost all of my classes were journalism related. I didn’t take those classes with the intention to come home and run the paper. I was simply pursuing what interested me.
At the end of my first year in college, Dad couldn’t work anymore. That Fall, I chose not to go back to college. After all, I had the newspaper to run. I chuckle to myself sometimes, looking back— I had a lot of help.
I have a lot of help now; from the local community, from readers, teachers, students, and from my family and the Star Eagle staff.
One reader commented this week that small towns are supposed to feel like family. I corrected them and said, “It is family. Some of us just argue with each other more than others.”
Both Reed and Dad told me that they have never seen the community involved with the paper the way it is now.
Dad told me, “People are always bringing stuff in for the paper.”
That has always been my goal. The community needs to feel like it’s their newspaper.
In all honesty, people have always brought stuff into the paper. I can’t really tell you how things were done before, but it makes me happy every time someone walks through the door with a picture, a memory, a unique story, or to just remind me of something in town worth a story.