The Overwhelming Potential of the Weekend

I have a son who thinks the most perfect Saturday imaginable is one spent entirely in his pajamas. I can remember how much I used to love Sunday afternoons after church when I could spend hours with a Sunday paper scattered across the floor into two somewhat organized piles of the sections I had read and those I had not yet read with another pile for the slick-paper inserts from which I had rescued the comics and Parade. I'm not sure I could spend hours with any Sunday paper I've seen lately without pharmaceuticals being involved.

I kind of like my kid's approach. I look around and weekends are becoming more and more like the other five days. A headlong rush of things that have to be done--not to mention that many of us spend at least part of a weekend working in these stressed, job poor times. Boy, wouldn't it be great to just decide to spend those Saturdays--especially these daylight-starved winter ones--in your pajamas? Maybe get a stack of magazines and pile them up around you in the floor and just read and sip on coffee.

I also look at this and think about how hard it is to write in such a world as ours. Now I'm not stranger to "get it out" writing as I spent lots of times in the newsrooms of daily newspapers. Life on the city desk of any daily newspaper is not a place of reflection and time spent lost in thought. But, even then, we had cycles as we didn't have the ever-present Internet that can be filled at any time with new copy. No, we had deadlines, editions and we days that closed out when final edition came off the press. Then it was time to breathe, think about what you had accomplished, read the product of your hard work and move on. But that is gone with today's world and I wonder if writing hasn't suffered much for it. Good writing requires a little bit of "soak time" to get the words out as you want them to be. While I'm not a slavish writer who goes through draft after draft--that's obvious enough from reading my work--I'm also noticing more and more that my writing is suffering at the hands of e-mail and instant communication. I fail all too often to actually go back and read what I wrote. And rare is the time when I set aside a piece of work and return to it with fresh eyes and a mind chilled from the fevered moments of creation. There's no time.

So, look at that weekend not as something to be filled in but, rather, as something to be lived in. Like a pair of comfortable pajamas. And, when you write, it's not a race to fill in that screen--or page if you're old-fashioned like me.

Who Do You Know?

"In an e-mail exchange with a friend of mine this morning, he was marveling at how I seem to be able to come up with experts when he needs one. Exact words: "It never ceases to amaze me who Richard knows." And I had to smile when I read this--not that smile of smug satisfaction, by the way.

No, I smiled because my friend had just defined what journalism is all about. Do journalists need to know lots of things and become subject matter experts in a wide range of areas? Of course not. I will take a journalist with a fat list of contacts over a know-it-all any day. It truly is a case of who you know versus what you know. I think good journalists are always looking for one more source, one more contact and one more person to add to their database.

Which brings me to the next thing in a good journalist's arsenal. The next best thing to knowing somebody who knows something is to know somebody who knows somebody who does. I've often said some of my best sources are ones I never quote in my articles. Instead, these are the people I can call any time and know that they will be able to tell me exactly the person I should call to get an answer to my question. Then they proceed to give me that person's contact information and offer me the option of saying that they said to call. Priceless.

The Brown Shoe Problem

Well, I always have to explain this one. It kind of follows the theme lately--under the category of phoning it in. The Brown Shoe Problem refers to something that is barely adequate and doing the least that is necessary to get by. In this instance I'm referring to the art of writing headlines.

Brown shoes are just that. Not all that interesting but they are shoes. Simple, plain, sturdy and kind of uninteresting. A Brown Shoe Headline Problem is also all of that. Favorite examples are things like: "City Council Meets" and "Legislature Considers Budget." There are many other headlines like that. Well, you know, they are accurate. The city council meets most all the time and the function of most legislatures is to consider a budget. But those headlines aren't all that interesting are they. They pretty much scream out "Don't Read Me!" or perhaps "Really Boring Article Under Here!"

Deadlines are wicked things. They force us to often do work that is good enough and to just get it out. On the Internet this is more true than ever, I suppose. But if you're writing something that is as interesting and compelling as a brown shoe, why bother? If the City Council met and spent three hours doing nothing but talk why not a headline that says so. I bet one headline that says: "City Council Talks Much, Does Little Tuesday Night" will see some more action on future agendas. Or, how about, "Legislature Talks Much; Plans to Spend More and Can't Say Why." Now that's a headline. Ultimate headline? "Read This or Die Now."

I think when it comes to writing and just facing those production pressures it's always easy to fall into the Brown Shoe Problem. And I fully understand those pressures. Believe me, I've written many headlines that just didn't sing. But it wouldn't hurt if, just every once in awhile, we all sat down and spent just a few minutes on those headlines. And, I'll bet, a few minutes on headlines would result in some rewriting of ledes and top grafs in our copy. And that is a nice Italian loafer.

Cops and Reporters

I noticed that former Greenville, S.C., Police Chief Mike Bridges has died. The photo here is from the Greenville News and was shot in his office--an office I remember well from my days as a young reporter at the The Greenville Piedmont, a now defunct afternoon newspaper.

My mornings during my shifts as a cops reporter would start by working my way through Greenville County's Law Enforcement Center, which housed the city's police department as well as much of the county's sheriff's office and the detention center. It was a one-stop cop shop for a reporter. And one of the routines of my morning rounds would involving having Chief Bridges wave to me from his office and ask me to come in and chat. Weather, news, sports, local government, what's going on--all were the topics on Chief Bridges' mind. But there was also an open door there that he wanted to make sure I understood. You have a question? Ask it. You want to know what I think about something? Ask me. Chief Bridges was always ready to talk and add his expertise or simply his opinion.

At the same time, I had pretty much unfettered access to his detectives, officers and department leaders. There was no asking permission to talk to me. Bridges trusted his officers, trusted his leadership and trusted me to talk to him if something didn't seem right. And he was always perfectly willing to say "I can't talk about that now but I will when I can." I respected that and understood the game. He also understood that I'd likely try to find my answers elsewhere and he would frequently hint as to where I might find them.

And, like any good cop, Chief Bridges had a wicked sense of humor and was quick to use it. It was sneaky and it was often unexpected as he was, after all, a serious man with a serious job. Cop humor is not subtle. Was there tension? Absolutely. There should be when journalism meets public officials. But Bridges was a quick study. He restricted the use of high-speed chases in his department. He used community policing tactics that included officers on horseback and bicycles. He encouraged his officers to find ways to solve problems that didn't involve the use of force and he had his department accredited by national policing organizations with strict rules about police procedures. He understood that public trust was much more to be desired than fear. His leaders were opinionated, plain spoken and quick to point out problems both in the department and in the community.

Rest in peace Chief Bridges. And thanks for your patience a long time ago when I'm sure I had no idea what I was doing.