Tag: hard news

The Birthday Box

Today is my birthday. A milestone, so that narrows it down some. But I am not going to share exactly how old I have become today. The reason is old-fashioned and likely a little vain. For my mother, it was a survival strategy. Especially in the workplace.

Mom used to talk about “the box people put you in.” Once people knew how old you were, she reasoned, they made assumptions. Often erroneous. Inevitably “limiting.” It is still the way it is “out there.” A 19-year-old singer on America’s Got Talent is viewed more favorably than a 27-year-old. Longer-term marketability, the younger they are.

In Mom’s case, she was a woman in a profession dominated by men. Truth be told in her generation, every professional field was dominated by men. There were a lot of truths about living in that reality, shared as sly witticisms that most women could relate to.

“To do as well as a man in the workplace, women have to be twice as good and work twice as hard as men do. Fortunately, that isn’t difficult.”

Or a more veiled reference: “It is hard to soar with eagles when I am surrounded by turkeys.” I remember a cartoon that circulated in Mom’s workplace. A down and dejected bald eagle is in the center of a group of blank-looking turkeys. The point hit home.

I knew the frustration of being expected to be a “hard news” reporter when that was the predominant role respected in our TV newsroom. If your strength was current affairs or my wheelhouse, human interest, you were clearly of less value than the ambulance chasers or political analysts.

Never mind that I actually enjoyed doing human interest pieces and that they were well-received. They were never going to grant me a shot at being a war correspondent or a bureau chief or heading up a newsroom.

Mom’s challenge was even harder in the 60s. There were distinct “ladies’ pages” in the newspaper business. And ladies, of course, were expected to “cover” issues of interest to other ladies. Teas, weddings, and significant births and deaths in the community. The social pages. Writing obituaries was clearly women’s work.

Mom fought for a “beat” like her male colleagues. After much cajoling and complaining she finally got her wish. She ended up covering the port of Saint John, New Brunswick with the comings and goings of major vessels and reports on the cargo they carried.

To my chagrin, she liked to announce to all and sundry when I was too young to see the humor that she had a job “working the waterfront.” The conjured image of my mother in fishnet stockings and too-high heels made me writhe in discomfort when she shared her little joke with my friends.

Today is more of a day of stock-taking for me. I look back on the other birthdays of other significant decades. I think about what I have and haven’t accomplished. Most poignant, of course, have been challenges that I did and those I did not overcome. Loss became a constant companion if not exactly a friend.

My dear friend Ursula Wawer, MD became a forensic psychiatrist. On a trip we once took, she seized upon a piece of art. It was a drawing of a maze of sorts with many paths but all leading ultimately to the same destination. She said at the time it was much like the healing path many of her patients took.

Not everyone comes to the same desirable destination of love, peace, and fulfillment via the same path. Ursula concluded it doesn’t matter how you get there. What does matter is that you keep putting one foot in front of the other. Do the work to eventually arrive where you want to be and not where others deem that you should be. That journey can take a lifetime.

And so it has been for me. Lots of learning along the way and many lessons I would rather have read about in a book instead of learning about them firsthand. Life isn’t fair and that is one of the biggest and most important learnings of all.

When you land at a point of your life at a destination you only once dreamed about, that feels like a life – if not consistently well-lived – then at least you can say it has been a life of some value.

As I “celebrate” my birthday today, just as you might be celebrating yours today or soon or certainly someday, that feels like the greatest present of all.

My life to date has been valuable to me for all the challenges, children, lessons, dear friends, adventures, and romantic experiences along the way.

I greet the upcoming decade with a warm welcome. Intention being about 99% of the success of any endeavor – another lesson I’ve learned. Bring it on. Happy birthday to me.

Say What

I am taking part in the Facebook Ultimate Blog Challenge. The ask is to post daily for the 30 days of April. If we do, I think we win a badge. That makes me happy. I am big on badges. Money would be nice but a badge will do.

If I’m honest, I had a bit of a head start on daily blog-writing, publishing my first post on March 14 and committing to do that daily for a year. (That could change and for an exceptionally good reason which I will address in a later post.)

Paul Taubman is running the challenge. Since April 1, he has been posting prompts I have blithely ignored until now. I have lots to write about. But his prompt today was not only an interesting ask but potentially valuable to me. For the memoir, I have to describe my ideal reader. As of now, I don’t know exactly who I should be writing for. Imagine, Paul suggests, sitting in a cafe with one of your blog readers. Letting them tell you what they need to hear. The exact words of Paul’s prompt:

Have Coffee With A Reader

If you were sitting in a coffee shop with one of your blog readers, what would you chat about? What would you like them to know? Or what would you like to know about them? Share it in a blog post.

I am naturally garrulous and gregarious (ie, verbose) and a former multi-media journalist. Talking to people is easy for me. Not just easy but usually enjoyable and occasionally fascinating. I believe every single person has a story to tell. Finding them was my main bread and butter as a CBC journalist. The newsroom hierarchy was such that you weren’t rising on the corporate ladder unless you were bent on pursuing “hard news.” My bent was more toward “human interest” stories. That is the sole reason I did not become the female version of Peter Mansbridge, the legendary CBC TV news host, of my set.

I did a few stories I was exceptionally proud of. Annie Cairns was an orphaned Middlemore Home schoolgirl who was moved from England to Canada at 14 in the 1940s. Her story was analogous to Anne of Green Gables as she evolved from a mistreated child to eventually become a settled wife, mother, and homemaker.

Annie’s story was broadcast on CBC radio and ripped off the cloak of shame she had worn all her life. She eventually traveled back to England and elsewhere around the world in the remaining years of her life. Free as a bird. That pleased me greatly. It was my first real-world experience of giving voice to a miserable history allowing them to drop the veil of shame that changed someone’s life for the better.

So, back to the present and Paul’s prompt, what would I ask a blog reader? I would want to know what grabbed them about any particular blog post they had read. What bored them? Or confused them? Did any of the posts delight them? Or repel them? I would want to know how to address readers’ concerns more directly. What would they want to know more about? What would they prefer never to hear tell of again?

I enjoy sharing my take on what I have learned about life in our time. It makes life make more sense to me, in fact. The lessons have been abundant. Sometimes hilarious. At other times, searingly painful. Wondrous. Perplexing. Savage and sacred. The whole enchilada.

I would like them to know about the lessons I have learned from the greats of history. Antoine St. Exupery’s The Little Prince taught me that we find love and meaning by pouring them into something we care about and watching it grow. Don Miguel de Ruiz’ The Four Agreements taught me to lighten up and not take everything people said personally. And to do my best no matter how lowly the task. Gandhi taught that lesson well as he cleaned latrines along with the untouchables caste in his Indian compound. That is the very definition of walking a mile in someone else’s moccasins.

I’d say more to my blog readers if I knew I had their ear. I’d ask them more questions. I’d probably get up and get us another coffee. And a couple of biscotti.

Writing this blog is something like starting a conversation. A little one-sided at the moment I grant you. But it is written in the hope that one day that conversation will become a two-way street. Even a multi-way street. Which would be – to use the parlance of the time – awesome.