Learning to Fly

Earlier this afternoon I happened to be in my room when housekeeping came, so we got to talking as she straightened out my mess and left me many bonus treats. I told her I was a journalist. And I was shocked how easily this response came from my lips. I haven't felt like a journalist since . . . well, it's been a really long time. I used to struggle in the early days of BnM to balance journalism and the positive outlook of the magazine. I mean it's a very biased approach to writing, to sort of put the blinders on and only write about the good stuff, and that, my friends, is NOT what journalism is all about. Yet, I agree with the concept of BnM wholeheartedly or I wouldn't be involved at all. Just yesterday I told a friend in Dieppe that I believed BnM was changing the collective consciousness of Miramichi, and I do! Our positivity, our willingness to seek out the good and showcase it for the general public, is making an impact. I honestly believe we are changing people's attitudes and having a positive influence and that this is the best thing that could happen for Miramichi. I am so honoured to be a part of it.

Yet, the only way I could give myself the freedom to fully embrace BnM was to abandon any thoughts I had about journalism. I needed to start thinking of myself in terms other than journalist or else I couldn't do it, because I was constantly running into the wall of "objectivity" . . . bnm is not objective, we are positive. It was a dilemma for a time, personally. So, eventually I made my peace with it by just stopping referring to myself or even thinking of myself as a journalist. I started to refer to myself exclusively as a writer or editor, and that gave me the freedom I needed in order to continue.

So, imagine my surprise this afternoon when the first words out of my mouth were that I was a journalist . . . a journalist from a Miramichi-based magazine called Bread 'n Molasses here to cover the Frye Festival . . . what the hell?! Can it be that I have had a breakthrough?! That I finally realize that in today's society no journalism is truly objective and therefore I deserve to be counted among the journalists just as much as anyone else?

Breakthrough in the Delta-Beausejour.

The thing is, I actually feel like a journalist being here, writing about these events. And I know I'm doing no worse job than CNN at objectivity, and maybe better, yet all those crazy news anchors call themselves journalists . . . so, why not me too?

Mood: nearly hungry
Drinking: nothing, have coffee and red wine ordered for dinner
Listening To: anarchy in the uk, sex pistols
Hair: maybe a little too blonde to be walking by that crack house later this evening