Tag: Life

EVERYONE’S FROM SOMEWHERE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

In the aftermath of major disasters, the wire services run a list of victims, something I used to think was to inform the editors of local newspapers of potential links to their own circulation area. But then my boss told me to run them.

“Why?” I asked. “We don’t have that much space for wire news.” Meaning national and international stories.

“Everybody’s from somewhere,” he answered. And I soon learned how true that was.

In fact, here in New Hampshire, we’ve come to expect a Granite State angle in almost every breaking story.

Small world, indeed.

ESTABLISHING MY CREDS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Longtime visitors to the Red Barn are likely aware that I spent four decades as a newspaper editor – experiences that feed into my latest novel, Hometown News.

It’s meant working nights, holidays, and weekends – rarely on a schedule matching the general public’s. And it’s always meant “working under deadline,” where an internal clock is always racing to finish the task on time (or else!). In addition, it’s also given me some insider looks at the surrounding world itself: having a celebrity standing a dozen feet behind your back is just another regular occurrence. (For the record, they often look quite different than they do on television.) Even as a cub reporter, I saw dead bodies, got inside the county morgue, checked out small plane crashes, met ex-movie stars, faced some stiff competition from the pros on the rival paper. Looking back, I sense how often I was in over my head and wonder how I ever survived.

These experiences have also fed into the Red Barn’s category of Newspaper Traditions, where I’ve written about:

  • The best newspaper ever” The glorious final days of the New York Herald Tribune were like no other newspaper. Nothing like fighting hard to the bitter end.
  • Chancing Upon a Profession: Glenn Thompson’s influence hit me, among many others, in one medium-sized city. He had a knack for finding talent.
  • Hot Type: In the days before phototypesetting and then digital publishing, newspaper production was a highly skilled craft. Here’s an admiration for the long gone masters.
  • Living Under Deadline: When your career hangs on meeting deadline after deadline, with no room to spare, you begin to live differently from other people.
  • The Art of Writing a Headline: Trying to steer readers to a given news report with just four words can be a real challenge. Take it from a pro.
  • Editing Obituaries: Announcing someone’s death and funeral arrangements can be more precarious than you’d imagine. This post, one of the most popular at the Red Barn, became a WordPress Freshly Pressed selection.
  • Four Measures: Just what makes “news,” anyone? Here’s one take.
  • Police Calls, 10 P.M.: Well, there is some behind-the-scenes banter, even when calling the cops.
  • One Phone Call Too Many: And then sometimes the facts get in the way of what looked like a great story.
  • Local, Local: How you define “local” news can backfire when it comes to your readers. Especially when it’s boring.
  • Bias: Sometimes those who accuse journalists of being biased should first look at themselves in the mirror.
  • The Shrinking Page: Like many other products, the newspaper page has been shrinking. It’s about half as wide as it was when I entered the trade.
  • The Human Imprint: Not too long ago, the editors and publishers were well-known public figures.
  • Objectivity, for Starters: There really were some strict standards and practices.
  • Windy City Perspectives: The tower of the Chicago Tribune holds some special memories for me.
  • Painful Neutrality: Again, maintaining a discipline of objectivity comes at a personal price.
  • Free of the Entourage: David Broder was the best of the breed. I wish I’d said hi.
  • End of the Line: One of the last editors who put a personal stamp on a paper was David Burgin. Maybe that’s why he was always getting fired.
  • Get Out of the Way: Real reporters are invisible observers. TV’s imitation inserts itself on the story.
  • You Read It Here First: Plagiarism has always been a dirty practice. Here are a few examples.
  • Reality Check: When it comes to seeing “liberal media,” some people fall off the far right of the world. The one that’s still flat.
  • A Logical Conclusion: The more conservative the nation’s editorial pages become, the more circulation declines. Think about that.
  • Death in the Afternoon: The newspapers published in the afternoon once had the blockbuster circulation. Here’s why they vanished.
  • Beware of Unintended Consequences: There are times embarrassing things slip into print. Lewd expressions, especially.
  • Beware of Survey Conclusions: Marketing research can lead to bad choices. It helps to put the findings in perspective before taking action.
  • So Much for Romance: And then there was the reporter’s lament as he returned from covering a large singles’ mixer.

I invite you to visit or revisit the postings, especially if you’re new here. And I promise there are more ahead.

~*~

While we’re at it, here are some pages from the New York Herald Tribune’s final years, when it established itself in my mind as the most elegant and exciting newspaper ever. (Remember, I was still a teen and a budding journalist.)

The daily edition.
The daily edition.
And Sunday.
And Sunday.

Among the Trib’s legacy was New York Magazine, which originated as the Trib’s Sunday glossy magazine. It was classic. And Book Week reflects a time when books were really important, at least in the eyes of the informed public.

The Sunday mag.
The Sunday mag.
And the books review section.
And the books review section.

~*~

Not all of the exciting journalistic action took place in Gotham or Fleet Street or Chicago’s competitive shootouts, though.

Much of the most dedicated and innovative work emerged in small communities in the heartland where a few individuals could make an obvious difference. That’s the story I explore in my latest novel. In some ways, it’s Tom Peters’ Pursuit of Excellence meets Dilbert on steroids. It might even resemble some places you’ve labored.

 ~*~

To find out more about Hometown News or to obtain your own copy, go to my page at Smashwords.com.

RUNNING WHILE I CAN

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

So we’re having coffee once again, one of my favorite authors and I, and while he’s a decade younger than me, I still marvel at his relentless output.

Why do you pace yourself that way, I ask.

Because time’s running short, he answers.

As I said, he’s a decade younger.

Maybe we should talk to an older painter we know, a good decade-and-a-half ahead of me. The one who’s still painting furiously. Quite possibly better than ever.

WHAT MAKES A VOICE DISTINCTIVE?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

You have to wonder what makes some voices so distinctive. Maybe it’s what makes a master. They way a few notes instantly separate Mozart from Haydn or announce Beethoven. A few strokes, a Rembrandt from Vermeer. Any number of writings.

I think of particular musicians, too. The conducting of Max Rudolf, for certain.

The way God claims to know each of us by our voice.

AFTER THE TRAGEDY

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Here in New England, the battle for control of the Market Basket supermarkets remains the biggest news story – but with a storybook twist. Rather than ending up as another soulless corporate bottom-line victim, there’s been a resurrection.

The bitter DeMoulas family feud finally led to an agreement less than a week ago in which the Good Guy (aka Arthur T) buys out the other half for roughly $1.5 billion. Ownership stays here at home. And, yes, there have been cheers all around in this remarkable alliance of stakeholders – managers, workers, loyal shoppers, and their communities – against the faction that fired the Good Guy and his visionary leadership.

The boycott held through August. The parking lots were vacant. Workers saw their hours cut. Some managers were fired … and now they’re back.

There’s almost a party atmosphere in the stores, but nobody’s slacking. Managers began showing up to work at midnight just an hour after reports of the agreement surfaced. Suppliers offered to deliver goods directly to the stores, rather than the distribution center, to speed the restocking of depleted shelves.

Many details remain to be ironed out, and a lot of damage will take time to repair. But at least there’s also a rainbow.

SPACE FOR DECOMPRESSION

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

It’s hard to believe five years have passed since we made the loft of the barn much more usable.

When we moved here, the loft was accessible only via a second-floor catwalk from the master bedroom, and getting there and back could be tricky, especially when snow was piled on the deck.

I’ll save the home renovation project description and photos for another time, and just mention that it involved removing the catwalk, deck, bedroom doorway, and barn loft doorway, installing stairs inside the barn and lighting in the loft.

What it essentially did was give us another 450 square feet of usable work and storage space – especially once we replaced the leaky roof two years ago. (Gee, I think that’s the size of some of those Ikea model apartments.)

Admittedly, it’s not someplace you linger for much of the year. It’s not insulated and there’s no heat, so you do little more than dash in and out in January-February or July-August, but for me it’s been a huge blessing.

As I wrote in August 2009, an “especially humid Tuesday: No Rick yesterday or today.” Our carpenter/master electrician was “off on another project.” We were in no rush, anyway. Still, enough of the project had progressed for me to note, “Having the top of the barn – the Squirrel Piss Studio or Jnana’s Red Barn or the Summer House – finally available as usable space is mind-boggling. At last! Ten years. A time for decompression, unpacking. The difference in scale as a result of the larger space (framed posters, for instance, now appear so much smaller).” I detailed more effusively in my journal. What I noted was “t

he array of items: places I’ve gone off to, to live. Sometimes unwillingly. The skulls – steer, horse, dog. Elk bones. Shells.

“So much to discard, too. My burgundy valet bag, an artifact of the past (after 9/11, nobody travels with one). Burgundy, LAL’s color. Same as the Chevy. The specially designed coat hangers, with their folding hooks – open for the hotel, closed to slide into the bag. Those two years, a ‘backpack for business travelers.’

“A Quaker altar: a candle on a piece of squared birch firewood, the side with bark facing the sitter; incense; in time, flowers or dried arrangement; Bible, Gita, notebook?

“I sit in the space and recall how Roger Pfingston could sit for hours in front of a blank piece of paper without writing a word. Maybe smoke a cigar. Now see it as his way of meditation and self-collection.”

The space also gave me a place to resume hatha yoga exercises after way too long a hiatus.

I love having large surfaces where I can spread out the pages for a poetry collection and rearrange the sequence. I’m not one who works easily with a crowded desk, unlike many of my colleagues. No, it’s Zen order or Quaker/Shaker simplicity I desire.

The loft is far from the year-round office studio I’d envisioned when we moved here. To get there, though, apart from the money, we’d have to cover the wooden underside of the roof I’ve come to enjoy viewing. The feel would become much different than the funky, well, summer cottage I so much enjoy now – even when it’s fall and spring rather than summer when I most use it.

Besides, to be candid, as I’m able to clean out and dispose of more and more, and as I move increasingly to online, paperless writing and submissions, I don’t really need the big office of those earlier dreams. At least that’s what I’m thinking now.

Who knows what’s really ahead.

NOT WHAT YOU THINK

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

I’ve always been a visual person. Had even considered a career in art before the writing took over. As further evidence, remembering a story or argument I’ve heard has always been more difficult to recall than one I’ve read. As for names, I’m hopeless unless there’s been a name tag.

Somehow, though, I can remember a musical line much more than I can any lyrics, including those we’ve been working on in chorus. So I’m not memory deaf, exactly.

As a visual person, I’ve found the point-and-shoot digital camera entries you’ve seen posted in my blogs to be a wonderful way of sharing the way I look at the world and many of the details that catch my attention.

But there’s another range of experiences I can’t begin to describe. Often, especially while watching people, my vision shifts from photo-realism to real-life cartoons. I hope I’m not staring, but the transformation is incredible. R. Crumb had nothing on me, other than technique. Sometimes they’re squiggling black-and-white line drawings. Sometimes, baroque etchings. Other times, wild blobs of color.

Even before they start moving.

SABBATICAL LESSONS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

As I said at the time …

When I was 38, several developments occurred in a way that allowed me to give myself a year of unemployment, drawing largely on savings. Rather than travel the world or undertake some related activity, I hunkered down in a writing spree [that resulted in the novels now (finally) being published]. The sabbatical meant that for the first time in my life, I had a period of uninterrupted concentration on this work. The writing itself. Three fast novels, now to be revised, and thud! skidding to a crash or whatever. Enough to expand to a dozen, in the hours of revision after I went back to the paying work. Looking back, I know it had to be done. And done then.

Nevertheless, in my struggle between practicality and art, there’s been a longstanding sense of guilt in spending time on myself. To my surprise, a resolution came through a workshop on prayer, when we were divided into smaller groups and then asked to write out a prayer request. Not for what others might need or a social issue, but for something we needed individually. “Ask for something for yourself,” which the others would then pray for.

Of course, each of us works differently. I’m not one for the blank sheet writer’s block syndrome: I’m usually springing from notes jotted down earlier. (Pacing is another matter: just where is this going? And why?)

In contrast, I recall a poet friend who was also a public school teacher; he was quite prolific during the busy school year, yet during the summer, could produce little, though he could never quite figure out why. (He could also stare at a piece of paper for five hours and then turn out a sharply focused gem.) The other friend, having all the leisure in the world, could produce only disconnected flashes. Could it be some juggling or resistance is also essential to the practice?

GODDESSES IN SUBURBIA

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

As I mentioned to her sometime back, I’d spent much time in a recent year reflecting on the jagged pathway that landed me here. Often I’ve felt I took one took many turns somewhere back there, and on some mornings after we moved into this house – well, some moments in my homes before that, too – I’d find myself wondering just where the hell I was, after all. In a bigger sense, I’ve been trying to envision how it all adds up. Guess it’s another version of the old “What is the meaning of life” conundrum. At least I finally figured out what I wanted to be when I grew up … retired! Meaning free to concentrate on the Real Work. (Now that I’m there, I’m finding more questions.)

In the round of reflection I’m discussing, I concentrated on high school and college – the emotional side, especially – meaning the time before I actually started keeping a journal, and a period that’s largely been a fog in my memory. I uncovered some wonderful prompts for revisiting this, especially letters from the sophomore high school English teacher who put me on the writing/strict grammar path, as well as a confession that despite all the contrary efforts, high school was a bummer. Unlike yours, my public school system was geared largely toward instilling conformity and retarding the growth of gifted students, unless you were a male athlete. Still, much has come back, making me wonder how I survived at all.

This round, I kept asking “What if” … for instance, one of those I saw as goddesses in high school had swept me away (or, more realistically, if I’d been able to say something close to what was really on my heart, or hormones, leading to some, shall we say, quality time together). Would I have continued at Wright State, rather than transferring to Indiana, and eventually stayed in Dayton, maybe even as a Republican? Or if either of my two girlfriends through the college years had led to marriage and home … both of them from Dayton, though neither ended up dwelling there, from what I can tell. Most of those goddesses wound up settling into mundane adult suburban lives, as I find from the class website and Internet – including our online class reunion site. I’m not kidding. (Who are all those old people in those silly photos? The ones holding beer bottles, especially.) (Note to self: Do not allow yourself to be photographed holding a beer bottle. Ever.)

On my part, what I keep finding is a sense of inevitability. Or, as Friends say, “As way opens,” if we’re faithful. There are good reasons I’m where I am, and for that I’m grateful, after so many seasons of sojourning. Even so, when your note arrives, there’s a tinge of sadness or gentle envy, as you live out what appears to be so close to what I had desired when I dreamed of being an independent writer living in my Promised Land, with a house full of my children and visiting friends and a quiet studio hut on the ridge behind. (My wife finds that vision humorous, by the way – finds holes in it all the way around, beginning with who’s going to clean up after the big parties I intended.)

Still, looking back, there are many things I don’t understand, and too many points where I’ve looked away or accepted a glib answer, rather than probing. I’ve always been prone to seeing what I want to see and overlooking the rest – usually, the warning signs and difficult details. (Again, my wife is good at bringing me back to the wider range of questions.) I’d say that trying to answer the inquiry of why you and I didn’t wind up together would be one of those. The astrological answer that you and I would never wind up together but remain prime friends fails to ask why. I believe there’s far more to be uncovered there, if we’re willing. Just why have you always made me feel better, for starters. Or feel special and elated.