When I was rescheduled to the night shift, I wasn’t home for as many meals together, for one thing. Or evenings.
It took a toll on the relationship, especially when she was working a day shift.
Tag: Jobs
On the continuing toll of the Internet on the livelihoods of creative souls
Fellow blogger Gary Hart recently had an eulogy for Outdoor Photography magazine, which prompted this comment from me:
“Your post mortem is one more story of the toll the Internet is taking on the income of many creative individuals. Freelance writers were devastated early on when their secondary markets for republication withered (anyone could already find the piece online). In professional photography, you lost sales to people who found your images posted online and were content with copies they printed out at home.
“Magazines faced a double whammy as content moved to the Web. Not only were sales and subscriptions shrinking, so was advertising, which paid most of the bills. In the case of photography, the products themselves were being rendered obsolete. Film, chemicals, papers, enlargers, darkrooms, and so on became ancient history and then, for the most part, so have cameras. What I’m getting with my cell phone, for instance, is unbelievable (though I know its imperfections, too). As a parallel, you can discuss what happened to the professional wedding photographer.
“Finally, as much as I love paper, I’m using far less of it as either a writer or a reader. Downsizing is one reason but not the only one.”
Will they even be called sportswriters anymore?
I’m still reeling from the decision at the New York Times to disband its sports department.
Admittedly, for much of my career, a newspaper’s sports staff was a mystery, set aside in a different room or even more elaborately from the rest of the reporters and editors. Sports seemed to demand a disproportional amount of newsprint, too, compared to, say, world news or even politics.
Only later, working at the fringe of Greater Boston with its intense team fanaticism, did I come to see things differently.
For one thing, the Boston Globe had some great sports coverage and I soon admired some of the writers. For another, I could see how the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics, and Bruins held the region together at a gut level as an extended community. Many of our obituaries, for instance, included the line, “She was an avid Sox fan” or the like. Devoted? Sometimes “rabid” would have been more accurate, but “avid” was the term of choice.
As a journalist, I envied the excellence at the top papers that resulted from deep planning and commitment as well as top talent. I could see that a few papers stood head and shoulders above the rest on that front – the Globe, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, and, of course, the New York Times. Gee, they even had expense accounts and travel.
~*~
Thus, the idea of shuttering a first-class operation seems extremely drastic.
Yet, the Times does differ from most other dailies. It is, for one thing, a national newspaper far more than a New York paper. High school sports are trivial in its scope, as are many college games. The city itself has not just one or two professional teams – or even four, like Boston – but two in baseball alone and two in football plus two in basketball, does anyone even care about hockey or soccer or tennis or golf or whatever else in that crush? There’s only so much space in a paper, after all.
Much of the coverage will be drawn from the Times’ subsidiary website, The Athlete, which already has a national focus and staffing. There is reason for concern, though, that those positions do not have union representation, unlike the Times.
The decision likely reflects a recognition of major shifts in sports coverage across the city and the county as well. Internet access means that scores and other statistics can be instantly browsed from anywhere, rather than having to wait for the paper to arrive.
Cable has expanded game availability to fans, even those living far from the teams.
And then what’s there left to say after ‘round-the-clock sports talk radio and all the call-in chatter?
The Times’ arts coverage has already undergone a similar evolution, with less coverage of events and more emphasis on trends and influences. That seems to be what we can expect on the athletic front next.
In the newsroom, we were always perplexed that a section that generated so much readership – presumably male – failed to garner much advertising support. Department stores and supermarkets didn’t want to appear there, nor did auto dealers and parts stores. As for restaurants or movie theaters or politicians? Remember, advertising, rather than subscribers or newsstand sales, paid the bulk of the bills.
Deadlines, too, often hinged on the final score of the day, at least for the morning papers. Back in the day when we still had afternoon papers, you could get a more leisurely account there before the next game. Either way, those deadlines have moved up for other reasons. No waiting around breathlessly.
~*~
How this will play out on local papers remains to be seen. All I know is that staffing and space and advertising are all way down there, too.
Adding to the memories
Sailors who visited Eastport for the Fourth of July voiced their amazement at the pilot who guided their U.S. Navy destroyer vessel at the Breakwater pier in some very dense fog.
They could hear the conversational voices of humans on the pier and shoreline but couldn’t see a thing. We could hear them but not see them, too.
And then they were landed, gently and safely.
They told us he was a magician, and from my angle of observation, it was true. Even the commanding officer was most amazed, in what became a memorable experience.
When it comes to work
How does “multitasking” differ from “running around in circles”?
Regarding the median age of tradesmen
As a passerby noted while observing renovation work in town, the median age of tradesmen in the U.S. is 57. It’s no doubt higher here in Maine and Sunrise County, especially.
There’s a lot of work needing to be done, too: carpentry, plumbing, roofing, masonry, insulating, windows … We have a long list ourselves and are still looking for help.
Forget the “Go west, young man,” advice of yore. Many youths would be well-advised to go into the construction trades, pronto. Financially, they’d be way ahead of those with a college degree but heavily in debt. They could even live wherever they want.
Hey, kids, if you love to hunt and fish or sail and camp, Sunrise County would fill your dreams. You’d definitely be welcome.
On a more personal note, send me your references and let’s talk.
Let’s haul on some sea chanteys
As I’ve previously noted, the work songs went into the woods in the winter, carried by sailors who came ashore for the season. But few songs in return migrated from the forests to the sea.
Women’s names could be a clue to the, uh, moral integrity of many messages. “Sally” or “Nancy,” for instance, some more sterling than others.
Other work songs include chain-gang ditties or even the racist, “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah,” though it might fit what’s become of the minimum-wage American workplace.
As for spellings, I’m sticking with “chantey,” based on a scholarly friend’s insistence the notes having a chanter setting the pace. “Shanty” and “chanty,” though, are more common.
Here are some related facts.
- This folk music genre flourished aboard larger merchant vessels of the 19th century as a means of setting a rhythm to optimize joint labor involved in either a pulling or pushing motion, such as lifting anchor or setting sail, tasks that required working together for a long time. Think of circling a capstan. Think “Heave!” Or “Haul!”
- That’s why many of them are about whaling.
- The tradition soared in the period between the War of 1812 and the Civil War and died out with the arrival of steam-powered ships.
- Its roots, though, go way back through earlier work songs around the world, including stevedores loading and unloading ships.
- Some of the chanteys originated with African-Americans performing “cotton-screwing” on shore, using a large screw-jack to compress and bale cotton for shipment from Southern ports. Some of the incomprehensible words in the songs are attributed to this.
- Essentially, it’s a call-and-response form between the solo chantey man and the work crew.
- Sometimes they were accompanied by a bosun’s pipe, fife, drum, or fiddle.
- They were sung by pirates, too.
- About 200 were set down on paper, but thousands more were likely lost.
- Some may have been used when relaxing in the evening.
A few lives I almost had … but I’ve wound up here instead
Being of an age where I have more to look back on than what lies ahead, pondering forks in the road I followed, I find myself concluding they ultimately turned out for the best.
Still, there are moments when I wonder how my life would have gone if, say, things had turned out better with certain lovers or I hadn’t narrowly missed out in a desired career move – things that would have opened other avenues. In fact, a big goal all along had been to become financially independent so I could hunker down with my more literary writing, the thing I’ve been able to do in retirement.
Here’s a handful.
- Been hired by a really big daily newspaper. The Wall Street Journal, especially, had been interested until laying off a ton of editors and reporters just before my graduation. And there had been a brief flirtation from the Washington Post and, later, Detroit Free Press.. My dreams of living in a major city, with all of its fine arts cultural opportunities, vanished with that.
- Returned to my hometown after college. Well, it would have left me deeply rooted. Or, in one scenario, wedded into a wealthy family on the other side of town, with all of the opportunities that would have afforded. But would I have found that too confining? (Said girlfriend ultimately did.) Instead, I was off into hippie communion and poverty-line journalist existence in foothills a few hours from New York City.
- Stayed in the ashram or at least the Asian spiritual stream. Yoga had saved my life and was a hot field, if I had been more entrepreneurial. But I wouldn’t have encountered Quakers and my family roots. Instead, leap ahead a few steps.
- Not persuaded my fiancée to overcome her jitters. That is, freed me to move on without her. She may have even closed off a few upward moves for us toward the end.
- Stayed with the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, had its major grant not been slashed shortly after being renewed. I would have had another four years in a big university setting, and my first wife could have earned her degree there rather than being uprooted. It might even have led me to graduate school and an academic career after all. But I did have dreams of mountains and wilderness, or else recognition as a poet, and those all led to the next fork.
- Remained in the Pacific Northwest. Despite the grueling demands of the office, my professional career was also exciting and on an upward swing. I was making inroads as a poet, too, and with the mountains and forests, I was living a dream. But there were dark clouds as well, any of which could have erupted even had I been able to relocate to the western side of the Cascades. Instead, I was soon in an eastward ricochet.
- Not faced marital difficulties. That is, had she been faithful rather than leading to divorce. Add to that my near miss with a big management job at America’s eighth biggest newspaper and its sterling ownership. Well, I probably would have had that big heart attack, too. Instead, I rebounded into a whirlwind romance with a sprite who seemed to be everything I ever desired. Leading to the next set of painful forks.
- Moved to Baltimore or managed to remain, including marriage to the dream of my life. First, that engagement went up in smoke and left me, well, a pile of emotional ashes. My hot job on the road covering 14 states turned into a dead end. And I failed to find a shared mission with a devoted lover who would have desired to have children together. From the start, I could have moved to, say, Boston, instead. At least I was able to give myself a sabbatical and hunker down writing for a year amid the debris.
- Had a book manuscript click with an agent or, more vitally, a commercial publisher. Or even a few critics. My goal of becoming financially independent kept slipping away, though my later friendship with one celebrated author has shown me how precarious that bestseller life can be. As for having a book take off? A writer can get trapped by success.
- Married the Georgian. She swept me off my feet, and how, maybe because she seemed to embody everything I thought I desired, as well as what she said she desired, as her mother reminded her. Yes, it was exciting, but after just a month, she panicked. Frankly, I soon saw it would have been a disaster. In addition, she never would have fit in as an editor’s wife, much less in any of the roles that might have opened later.
When I look at the forks I chose to follow, I have to admit the one of going back into the ranks of the newsroom rather than management was crucial. The reasons I stayed there could easily fill another Tendril.
So what’s on your agenda for today?
Do any of you have a recurring sensation of falling further behind in what you’re hoping to accomplish in a given day?
Is it one of the curses of being a “responsible adult”?
The mere thought of being seen as lazy or unproductive stirs up feelings of guilt and shame within me.
I can’t even imagine setting out without a to-do list. How about you?
And here I am, supposedly retired.
Not that I’m complaining. Now please excuse me while I move on to the next item.
As an epitaph
I tried.
And tried.
And tried.
Damn it.
Jnana's Red Barn 