Loss and saying goodbye

I am almost afraid to read the paper these days. It seems every time I do, there is someone I know listed in the obituaries. It is always a shock, accompanied by varying degrees of personal sadness.

During those times, I have to fight the urge to interview family members and friends to construct a story to memorialize them. I had written such stories for so long. In all my years writing for a newspaper, memorials were always one of my least favorite stories to write. They were difficult because they were so important. As the last comments ever said about a person, those stories almost always had an impact. They were so positive. Something can be said in those final moments after death about every person, whether they lead the life of a celebrity or are a homeless recluse. Every person has a story. Everybody does something well. Often times, that final story is the only time a person's name ever appears in a newspaper.

I didn't write about every person who died in our town, but I wrote about those who were prominent members of the community. Stories memorializing the deceased was also warranted if a death accompanied a news event, such as an accident or other tragic circumstance. I also wrote about people I knew to be special.

Most newspapers have their own policy regarding obituaries and death notices. It was through those guidelines that I learned the mechanics of writing them. As the years went on though, I realized how invaluable they were to grieving families. They were always clipped and saved. They deserved effort. Nearly every one of the stories I wrote became personal to me. I put my heart and soul into them. I often cried when I wrote them. If I knew the person who died and was fond of them, I often wrote the words straight from my heart, because I too was saying goodbye. 

The memories and feelings that are conjured up by a person's death, at least for me, come from a place beyond my conscious mind. Just seeing a name or a picture can awaken emotions that I may have not even known were there. It is almost like that little sound you make when you are startled. You hear it, and know it came out of you, but you have no idea how, why, or where it came from. 

This morning I read an obituary for a woman that I knew. Had I still lived there, I would have certainly written about her. She was a good, caring woman who was always helpful to others; she was a volunteer who devoted her time and energy to causes she believed in. She was feisty and funny. Truthfully, she was no  more than an acquaintance, but there was something about her warm smile and a good-natured heart. I admired her spunk. Rest in peace Barb Oliver.

Bad blogger, bad blogger

It has been a while since I've written in this blog, but not because I've given up writing; quite the contrary. I have been writing more of late.

In fact, I recently became re-employed. I was laid off in March from a small weekly, Illinois newspaper where I have worked since 1999. Even after my husband and I moved to Arkansas, I contributed stories of local interest to that paper. That always cracks me up. But except for face-to-face interviews and physically covering meetings, most of what I do can be done over the phone or via email, virtually from anywhere.

Last fall, another reporter, was also let go for cost-savings. She decided to start her own newspaper. Though she and I have never met, she had heard good things about my work. She sent me an email to ask if I'd consider writing for her. I agreed.

It took a while to get up to speed on what was happening in neighborhoods 600 miles away from where I live, but with long friendships and acquaintances, it wasn't too difficult.

Some of my latest projects have had to do with the state's effort to build a new airport. It is a project that to me never really made sense. But, Illinois politicans remain determined to dust off a 1968 idea, spend money on new marketing strategies, and keep the thing alive. Most of their promises continue to amount to nothing more than politcian-speak. I doubt they will ever succeed.

I've followed their progress, or lack of it, since 1985, back when I was a simple housewife and stay-at-hom mom who heard about what I thought was an outlandish scheme to build an airport larger than O'Hare International Airport, one of the busiest airports in the world in the farm fields some 40 miles south of Chicago. It was easy to be 'no airport.'

I was born in Chicago and grew up a few miles from O'Hare.

Those are very different places than the small farm town surrounded by country where I lived. Yet it was just a few miles from the project's proposed location. An airport just didn't fit. I was inspired to fight the thing, so I hung up my apron and grabbed a pencil and writing pad. I never thought the battle would last most of my adult life.

The people didn't want it. The local governments didn't want it. The airlines didn't want it. Only the politicans, real estate agents, construction workers, and land speculators wanted it. And they had all the political clout. The good folks that would be displaced had none.

That pen and paper came in handy because just a few months later, the fates led me to the newsroom of a daily newspaper who hired me to write about this and many other things. And now, as of last November, that is what I continue to do.

Some of the stories I've written about this project and others can be viewed on my blog at CHBlog. Most of them are published.

It is pretty late for New Years' resolutions, but I think I will make one anyway. I'm going to try to be more diligent at writing in my blog.

Newspapers and truth

When Developers get too close, an editorial about Will County corruption which elaborates on Kristen McQueary's very poignant column yesterday, see Kudos for good journalism below, is often lacking in the newspaper business. Had there been more of this sort of thing, perhaps newspapers would not be in danger of failing altogether. And what a tragedy that would be.

Newspapers blame the Internet for their demise. But that is only a part of the equation. The newspaper was supposed to stand for truth, given every effort to see and report all angles of a story. A wise editor once told me that if you think you have both sides of the story, you probably don't have the whole story.

Newsrooms used to be peppered with highly-principled curmudgeons who served as role models for young reporters. Fighting for the little guy was business as usual. In those days public places were filled with seemingly headless people whose faces were buried in the outstretched double pages of their daily newspaper. Folks read the news with the unshakable belief that what they read was the unvarnished truth. They believed what they read because newspapers had a reputation.

Today people read a newspaper to get the latest sports scores. They want to see television listings. They rarely care about the news. While that isn't entirely the fault of the newspaper, the industry simply gave in, doing little to maintain what it used to stand for. It lowered the bar instead of challenging its readers. It caved into the capitalist model to make money at all cost, despite the fact that the Fourth Estate should have risen above that used by other businesses. Perhaps if the news had been written with a perspective the public could relate to, in a world where the little guy was being tormented by its own government, they would have kept reading. Yet how many times have stories been reported that take the side of the politically correct which is far from correct? All too often stories originate from sugar-coated press releases. Most papers fail to employ investigative reporters at a time when they are most needed. And how often has the view of advertisers colored the view of the news we read?

Kudos to the Southtown Star for remembering its humble beginnings as the Southtown Economist covering the south side of Chicago a generation ago. And to Kristen McQueary who has proven to be a peoples' reporter. Keep up the good work.