You’d think a narcissist would be his own biggest fan. Apparently, that’s not exactly so. Despite my general belief that I get high marks in most notable categories — intellect, sense of humor, general societal value — I find my image in the rear view mirror to be generally unpleasant (Caution: Objects in mirror are closer than they appear). I wince when I read of my enthusiasm about a job that has been immensely disheartening, disappointing, and depressing. I’ve turned in plenty in the past nine months that has been way less than stellar. Sometimes I blame myself, other times I blame The Biz.
LESSON #1: The news business is not what you think it is; nor is it what you wish it to be.
As I look back on the different places I have toiled since graduating from college, my experience as a photojournalist is unique; it is the first time I have been disappointed in the job rather than disappointed in myself for having the job. I hated being a bartender because I didn’t use any of the natural gifts at my disposal; it was beneath me. In fact, it played to my weaknesses rather than my strengths. I’m socially awkward and generally unpleasant towards strangers. Yea! Let’s put that guy behind the bar.
But being a photojournalist was different. Not only did I see a chance to finally employ the aesthetic skills I’ve been honing since I was a boy, but I saw an opportunity to affect positive change in my community, be a sounding board for the downtrodden, all that idealistic shit. Sadly, that’s not the world of television news. More often than not, television news is about ambulance chasing. Tonight I spent most of my evening following a story about a woman who got a DUI while her baby was on the floor in the backseat of her car.Now how many people does this effect in the grand scheme of things? Very few.
But it’s outrageous. It’s infuriating. So, it’s news.
Meanwhile, last night the Rock Island school board held its first public forum concerning restructuring of the school district, and the turnout was incredibly disappointing. This was a meeting that effects a great number of people directly, and the entire city of Rock Island indirectly, and its turn out was tragically light. And you can include KWQC on the absent list. We didn’t even go. Not when there was a car chase and a meth bust to cover.
The newsroom consistently breaks my heart. Which is one reason why I’m leaving it. The other reason is…
Lesson #2: I can’t stomach the field.
Two weeks ago, a nine year old boy drowned in the Mississippi River. Naturally, we were all over it.
The first thing I saw when I arrived on the scene was the boy’s grandmother, wailing and flailing her arms when she saw another truck descending on her family. She eventually turned away from us and rendezvoused with her family a hundred yards down the river.
For the next three hours we huddled in our truck, waiting for some resolution to the incident. My reporter was taken upstream to do a live shot, while I waited for any word from the police. When the cops finally made their way over, they set up their impromptu press conference in a place the forced me to intersect with the upset grandmother on my way to the interview.
And she let me have it. I had misgivings about being there in the first place, and now I had a grieving grandmother wailing at me (I’m shocked I wasn’t struck during this whole ordeal).
“Why are you here?” she screamed. “Leave us alone! There’s no reason for you to be here!”
For what seemed like ages she screamed at me, while her family tried to pull her away. Meanwhile, I backed up against a fence, trying to squeeze by and refusing to look the poor woman in the face. I wish I could have levied some argument against her, but she was right. In fact, the majority of the stories we cover are merely the suffering of others that we somehow justify with that amorphous maxim:
“It’s news.”
“Your house just burnt down? Sorry, it’s news.”
“Father died in a car accident? It’s news.”
“Your son died in Iraq? Would you care to talk to us about it?”
So much of a journalists career is tracking the scent of other people’s misery, but I’ve been sick of the smell for a very long time.
Lesson #3 — Relief doesn’t suit me.
A little over a year ago I wrote one of the most poignant and important essays I’ve ever written. It was called The Hum, and it was all about the vague sensation of uneasiness that my family and I lived with every day during my brother’s Iraq deployment. Well, my brother returned just a month after its posting — injured, but alive — and I’d imagine for most of our family and my brother’s friends, The Hum disappeared. For me, it hasn’t, and my relationship with it has changed since my brother’s return. When he was gone, The Hum was a manifestation of my fear that my brother would be killed in Iraq. Now, The Hum is my fear. And with such an indistinct apprehension, there’s never a sense that the threat is over. There’s never any relief.
Lessons #3 & #4: Patience is Unbearable & Disorder is Not My Friend
5. Patience is an impossible virtue.
6. You know you have a problem with gas station food when you’re changing the ones you go to.
7. Disorder is not my friend.
8. I haven’t been on my own in three years.
9. Dating friends is hard.
10. Grandma is always going to be better. That’s why she’s called “Grand.”
