Friday the 13th – Not Just Any Other Day

“Triskaidekaphobia – fear of the number 13” – http://www.merriam-webster.com.

I don’t fear Friday the 13^th as much as I’ve learned to respect it.

On Friday, May 13, 1988, a letter arrived in the mail that drastically changed my life.

The letter from the San Francisco Bay Area-based Institute for Journalism Education (IJE, now the Maynard Institute for JournalismEducation) informed me that I was invited to an interview at the UC Berkeley School of Journalism, where the institute was hosting a 13-week “journalism boot camp” for aspiring newspaper journalists. A career door finally opened after struggling in dead-end clerical positions five years after I graduated from the University of California, Davis.

That year, I was a secretary-typist for a consulting firm in north Sacramento. In my spare time, I was attending classes at Cosumnes River College in south Sacramento to qualify for internships I later earned at two local television stations – KCRA-TV 3, the NBC affiliate, and KTXL 40, the local affiliate for the new Fox network. I was also writing articles for the Sacramento Observer weekly newspaper, hoping to get some clips for my portfolio.

In the winter of 1988, I had applied to IJE’s Summer Program for Minority Journalists, which takes only 10 people annually out of hundreds of applicants. When I received the rejection letter in March, I figured I would apply to California State University, Sacramento, and work toward my master’s degree in journalism and see if I could get into the field that way. (I’m a big believer in having a Plan B, Plan C, Plan D … you get the idea.)

I arrived home to my South Natomas apartment at the end of a mind-numbing week of work with my bunch of mail from my mailbox. Then I saw the letter from IJE. “What could they possibly want?” I thought. “I was already rejected.”

When I opened the letter and read the contents, my jaw dropped and my eyes filled with tears.

The letter read that I was being invited to a writing test and interview with IJE at the UC Berkeley School of Journalism. I would interview with Jeff Rivers for one of the last few slots. Director Ira J. Hadnot signed the letter.

I was floored. Then I realized what entering the program would mean – 13 weeks in the Bay Area, followed by working for a year with a newspaper that, more likely than not, would be outside California, the home I had known since birth. A mix of excitement and fear prevented me from sleeping well that night.

Long story short, I not only got into the program, I completed it and went to work for The Bellingham Herald, a small newspaper in northwest Washington state then owned by Gannett. (McClatchy now owns the Herald.) I spent 11 months there before returning to California to work for the Daily Republic in Fairfield.

Some people have asked if I regret having been a newspaper reporter. I usually reply, “Never.”

Bad things do happy on Friday the 13^th, but so do good things. I’ve learned that it’s not just any other day. Who knows what will happen today?

Writing Diva

The Year the Music Died

During the past five months, music lovers have experienced the loss of several authors to what I call “the soundtracks of our lives.” Natalie Cole (who died on New Year’s Eve); David Bowie; Maurice White of Earth, Wind, and Fire; Glenn Frey of the Eagles; Nicholas Caldwell of the Whispers; Dan Hicks; Gayle McCormick, the lead singer of Smith who belted a rocking rendition of “Baby, It’s You”; Sir George Martin, record producer for the Beatles; Merle Haggard; Prince; Billy Paul (“Me and Mrs. Jones”). This year, 2016, has seen the passing of what appears to be more famous artists than in previous years.

Maybe it appears that way because we Baby Boomers grew up listening to the music of these artists. For me, the deaths of these musicians make me think of my mortality.

The recent untimely death of Prince, 57, stunned me most. He is only three years and three months older than I, so he’s a contemporary. Twenty of his songs are on my iPod, and I have his “Musicology” CD at home. When my sister Black Woman Blogging and I heard that Prince was going to perform two shows in Oakland, we wanted to get tickets. But, with any Prince performance, it sold out as soon as the concerts were announced.

I thought that we would be able to see Prince another time. That was not to be.

What saddens me is that the artists of the soundtracks of our lives are passing away. These passings remind us that we, too, have limited time on this Earth. (By the way, I believe that each of us has a soundtrack. We have to listen for it.) All I can do is cherish the music these gifted musicians left behind and live in such in such a way that we leave behind our gifts for others to enjoy.

I still feel wistful over the passage of time and the passing of these artists. But I’ll go forward.

Writing Diva