First day back

I begin again.

Today was, in my mind, my first day back at The River Reporter, as its publisher.

My friends have been ribbing me all month when I told them that I wasn't starting work until September 5.  I had in my mind this idea that I would spend July and August preparing everything that I needed to start fresh, at a job where I will celebrate my 40th year in February.

Yeah, right!

But it's true.  Today was my first day back on the job -- after spending 11 years getting credentialed as a UU Minister.  That preparation, that ministerial formation, I did so that my work would be rooted in meaning.

It's a noble and extremely credible idea that newspapers can support a community in a way that no other entity can.

So, getting back to my friends, it isn't that I haven't been working this summer.  I know.

I have been in and out of the office. I've been observing.  I've been present at community events, giving awards for Sullivan Renaissance, participating in Workforce Development summer program explanations, talking with public health service personnel about what they need, about how a community newspaper organization can help get the word out on addiction. (How it affects everybody -- not just those that we think of -- those lazy bastards -- as addicts.  Yeah, and your grandmother is addicted because physicians have been managing pain these days with opioids. So, truly, the addict is not who you think they are.)

What I tried to do is ease in.  To get the lay of the land.  To somehow finesse how the heck I am going to navigate what I think needs to be done.  It's a  huge undertaking to attempt to turn around a fledgling and always financially struggling newspaper entity at this moment when newspapers are having very difficult times.

In one sense, my 40 years that I have worked in this business makes me a bit blase about the changing landscape.  The newspaper I manage has never had enough money for much of anything. What we have always had is a sense of drive.  A sense of knowing what we are doing and a sense of going about doing it.

We, me, the paper, have always struggled for sustainability.

And we've been fortunate.  We have always had an owner who was willing to invest.  Who was willing to look at what it is that the paper provides and understand that someone, in fact, a lot of someones, has to invest in it.

And that is what I have done.  Always.  For better or for worse, I have invested my life.

And I'm happy for it.  Really.

I went to seminary to become more articulate about why I put myself through this turmoil.

And I, perhaps, more than anyone, look forward to that articulation.

But mostly,  I look forward to somehow providing a populace with information and knowledge, in a package they appreciate and support financially.

This at the end of my first day back.