Newspaper Days, Part 2: you can’t run from the past, so why not embrace the best of it? in Daydreaming on the Porch

This is another story from the memory vault of my past, which I am continually opening in these pandemic days when I seem to have much more than the normal amount of time for self-reflection. Maybe too much, I don’t know.

Here I’m digging way back to 1978, which found me at at small-town newspaper working harder than I ever had in my life, and for peanuts, but what did I care? It paid the rent. I was 27. It was the crazy Seventies, and I was loving everything about newspaper work because it was what I really wanted to do.

My reporting beat was the county school board, but I had great freedom and latitude to choose and write features stories on just about any topic I wanted. My editor always approved my ideas, but often I didn’t even have to go to him for an okay. Being a liberal arts major in college, and a naturally inquisitive and curious person, the sky was just about the limit.

I interviewed countless people who had stories to tell about their lives, work and experiences. There was always a “hook,” we called it, around which a particular story or interview revolved. The person, organization or business had an unusual news or feature-worthy angler to tell that not only made it fun for me to go out and get the story, but interesting reading for our subscribers and readers. In a small town, people tend to know a lot of other people in the community, so most stories I did had an almost guaranteed readership. Also, I got to know, even if just for a brief moment in time, some pretty remarkable individuals whose stories would have gone untold if I had not heard and wrote about them.

My first published feature story at a prior newspaper job was about a charming and dear 90-year old lady who resided in a nursing home. She had been a flapper dancer in the 1920s, and was a stand-in for the silent film star, Clara Bow. You can imagine the stories she had to tell.

I recall a lot about the small town I’m remembering tonight, and it’s newspaper. The feature stories I wrote interested me greatly. There was a fascinating gentleman who was a miller and still operated a grist mill in the country on a small creek. I have been interested in grist mills since I was a child, and that I interview and story were like a dream come true. I took a lot of photos to go with the full-page article in the newspaper. Another time I interviewed a local historian about an infamous duel that occurred in the county in the mid 19h century. Another time I wrote about a Greek couple who were closing their family’s restaurant after almost 50 years. That was a memorable occasion. I have such good memories of that interview in the restaurant. Not long after I arrived at the newspaper I interviewed a man whose passion was restoring antique cars. I could go on. I still have many clippings of those favorite stories.

There are a number of reasons I’m finally writing about that long-ago work experience. It lasted less than two years, and what brought it to an end was a strange, and perhaps inevitable, confluence of events: a company that was in a fiercely competitive race for local news dominance with an upstart and maverick, competing weekly paper, resulting in impossible work demands of me; a doomed friendship/relationship that I seemed fated to have, but in which I was totally in over my head before I fully knew what was happening; and finally the near loss of two of my closest friends, who l had begun my newspaper career with four years earlier. I left the job and a period of deep depression followed, which I’ve written about previously.

I would say I reached the pinnacle of my success as a newspaper writer during that time, only to see everything crash and burn. So even though I haven’t been back to that town in 40 years, and seriously doubt I ever will, I refuse to let personal tragedy destroy the many good memories I have of the place and the people I worked with. Everyone has problems. I just got in the midst of one too many. It’s a chapter in my life that I’ve never been able to close and walk away from, as awful as the time afterward was, but actually, why should I? I relive the pain of that time sometimes as flashbacks and often in recurring dreams, but now I’m consciously recalling some of the unforgettable and positive experiences.. Since it’s all a distinct part of who I am today, I choose neither to bury the bad memories for good (as if I ever could), nor wallow in the harrowing memories of a depressive episode that seemed to offer no way out.

The following feature story written in 1978, is a perfect example of 1) my lifelong interest in oral history and telling and preserving in print the stories of an older generation before they are gone, and 2) a confirmation of the rich and invaluable experiences I had despite the dark cloud of memories that only temporarily put out the light I wanted to shine in others’ lives. Writers, no matter what kind, have a unique opportunity to illuminate small corners of the world for others..

She Knows Hard Work

She’s worked in the fields a good part of her life, has raised 13 children, and still picks the banjo occasionally.

As she sat on her porch and picked her banjo, faltering yet clear notes punctuated the late afternoon stillness. An easy smile quickly animated her expressions as she gazed out over the yard, no doubt thinking of lively times when her fingers flew across that five-string banjo.

Arrie Reynolds

Last updated October 27, 2020