For those who've left: any regrets?

Doc, at first I was laid off, but then I got another job in a much duller if more lucrative job. Now I am so old that I'd be retired if th Herald had kept me. I wouldn't trade a second of the 30 years of journalism I was lucky enough to experience. But a little over a decade later, I wouldn't go back on a bet. You can love something (Someone) very much and cherish the love forever and still realize it's better off gone.

 

Makes perfect sense to me. Just seemed like everyone was quick to pile on but failed to acknowledge that it's a great profession. You don't do it for money or weekends, holidays or nights off. You do it because it's who you are. When I walk away, and I will walk away or get thrown away soon enough, it will be with a heavy heart and many wonderful memories.

My only regret when I'm gone? That the business changed from what it once was. If not for that, I wouldn't change a thing.

 

I'll approach it from the direction of someone who got out once and stayed out for two years. Between a freelance copy-editing gig and part-time sales work, I was making ends meet during those two years, but that was about it. So when a newspaper made me an offer in 2010, I got back in -- knowing full well I'd have to work another 10 years or so and that it was a crapshoot whether that would happen. Like many, I regret what the profession has become -- good people getting laid off, embarrassingly early deadlines, management by metrics and dunderhead upper managers who speak in buzzwords and have tried to cut their way to profitability and failed. I regret that the state of the business has forced me to consider other opportunities and that my newspaper career might end a few years earlier than I'd hoped. But do I regret getting back into the business? Not in 2010, and not now.

 

I think maybe I've worked 50-55 hours a couple of times. But not in the past decade. Got comp time for it, IIRC. Holidays? That's double time and a half, baby. No complaints about that.

60 hours? 70? 80? Fuck, no. That's for hospital residents.

Maybe that's why I still do this stuff. As long as they'll have me, anyway.

 

D9c it is not a great profession. In fact it is perhaps the worst. It has been the worst for 10 years now. Reporters were furloughed, no raises, treated with disrespect in making them work 70 and get paid 40. No other profession in which you are paid so little gets away with that. It is a horrible horrible profession and anybody who wants to major in journalism now NEEDS to get a double major to fall back on. This is a horrible life; a horrible job.
The problem is reporters get addicted to the rush and the job and the byline and once addicted they are stuck until they get laid off. It's a very very very bad profession.

 

One thing that some have alluded to but not mentioned is that, newspaper work, by its very nature, is actually addictive. And journalists, generally passionate and usually intense, caring and principled people that they are, can easily fall into addiction, even with regard to their work, especially because the demands of the job are so great, and so expected, and so normalized.

When I was in newspapers, my work was my life. Besides my family, nothing else mattered much, and even they understood how absorbed I was. I suspect that that is the case for most of the people on this board. When I left, it wasn't easily, voluntarily, or happily, or because I thought or knew that life could or would be better once I was out.

Just the opposite, in fact. I was devastated, and tried to continue/rebuild/restart, with a little freelancing success but with nothing that was regular/full-time or permanent coming my way. And I knew I didn't want to freelance forever. It was that all-or-nothing tendency rearing its head, even in my leaving. If I could not work regularly, in a full-time job, on staff, I knew I wouldn't be much longer for the business.

Nonetheless, eventually, life DID become better for being out of newspapers. It's just that this is something that you can't possibly realize or know until the time comes and you have, in fact, been out for awhile.

When people say it's better, it' not because of any desire to pile on, and I don't think anyone means it gleefully. It just IS better, that's all. Any time constraints/deadlines are easier, work is not usually a 24/7 endeavor, pay is often as good or better, and if it isn't, the stress is less, and the idea of not taking work home with you is a genuine, almost life-changing, revelation.

Work becomes just work, a job a job, and not, your life, or an addiction, or something almost like one. How can anyone have regrets about that? When we say we don't regret leaving, it's because we now have the perspective to realize that, not necessarily because we regret having been in the business in the first place.

I don't, and my leaving was just about as hard as it could have possibly been.

Indeed, that was largely how/why I came here. I was badly hurt, and still wanted so much to be back where I was, that I was glad to find a place full of journalists with whom to connect once it became harder to do that. I mentioned in an earlier post that the people in journalism were what/who I missed the most. I always did, and I still do, think that journalists are among the most intelligent, interesting and empathetic people I know, and now, I just enjoy the good discussions. It's a good enough "fix" now, because I still could talk shop with anybody, and love doing so, whether it's with regard to newspapers, or Walmart.

Usually, I feel fortunate, even honored, to be here. And you all should be honored that I'm here . Seriously, this is one of only two web site message boards that I frequent, the other being obesityhelp.com.

 

The problem is that you're obsessed with the problem, especially for someone who has stayed in it. I mean, I obviously have no problem with the occasional rant. You, though, have got to be really, really miserable a lot of the time.

You seem to have forgotten there was a reason you got into newspapers in the first place. I'm out, and I haven't forgotten why.

 

The only regret I have is that I dedicated 10 years of my life to it in the first place.

 

The discussion was about leaving journalism, not leaving SJ.com!

 

I think of the Godfather line "I try to get out... and they PULL ME BACK IN!"

Just throwing in a couple observations here. I obviously didn't get out of newspapers, but I've observed an awful lot in my time searching for a new job.

When MLive wouldn't give me more responsibilities or a bigger job despite several years of outstanding reviews, I began looking in earnest around the fall of 2014. I had various nibbles from papers and even got to go out for two face-to-face interviews, one in Aberdeen, South Dakota and the other at the Louisville Design Studio for Gannett. Didn't get either job but both trips were fun and met some nice people along the way.

In addition to the newspapers I tried to go into college communications departments and sports information, and even a couple of corporate listings. Made sure someone in the building knew of my interest so I wouldn't get automatically rejected by HR. Never heard a peep from a lot of those places, which made me think "If I'm supposedly as good as everyone says I am, then why will no one give me the fucking time of day?"

Did I smell? Was I offensive? Did people think I wanted a million bucks a year just because I was nearly 50?

But I kept on plugging. This past spring and early summer, I applied for the Director of Communications position at a small college in Kansas (an area AD is a graduate and is on the board, and he recommended I apply). I also put in for a full-time SID opening at an NAIA school here in Grand Rapids, an athletic communications position at Ohio State, the prep editor job in Colorado Springs, a sports editor job in Utica, N.Y., and a copy editor/page designer job in Toledo.

I had phone interviews with the Kansas college and with Utica and Colorado Springs. The colleges wouldn't give me the time of day, despite a few coaches at the NAIA school saying I needed to be brought in for an interview. I so wanted to use the "Don't you know who I am?" phrase on the athletic director, but the truth is he wouldn't know me.

Utica wanted to fly me out for a face to face, but Toledo needed an answer from me. So I took the sure thing, threw up my hands and went to the Blade when they contacted me. I was temporarily out of work following my MLive layoff a few weeks ago, but barring the results of the drug test and background check I start September 18.

No doubt some people groaned when I went back to newspapers so quickly. But, like I told everyone on Facebook, this is what I know how to do. And if you don't want to take a chance on me outside newspapers, then I'm going to go back to a field where someone will.

 

Because I've been posting on this board since its inception. That's why I'm still around.

I have zero regrets about leaving. Might have felt different had I reached a larger paper before making the change. I had no choice but to get out or I was going to become a lifer in a small city making no money.

 

Sounds like you miss it, just weren't cut out for it. That's a regret.