Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Imagine ...

Ever since I left journalism to defect to PR, I have felt the occasional pang of regret. Now, I am not a regretful person, generally speaking. But those first months after I left the newspaper, I would sit at my desk on the 23rd floor of Grey Advertising's headquarters in Manhattan and shed a tear at 1 p.m., the deadline for the Daily Jefferson County Union in little Ft. Atkinson, Wisconsin. Because I missed it so much. That's how pathetic I was ... am.

At the time, I was a newly minted college grad, stuck in a small town in Wisconsin, working for $11,000 a year (with city council and school board meetings at night, I managed to earn $3,000 in overtime to bring my total to $14,000! $14,000!), and I wanted to see the world. Or at least Manhattan. So I ditched journalism and grabbed the miraculous PR internship that was on offer.

Honestly, though, I think journalism and I were the best career match. Journalism is instinctual to me; PR was learned. Have you ever felt that way about a job?

So I find it heartening that many years later -- 22 to be exact -- there is a potential journalism job in the offing. I can't jinx myself by writing more. Suffice it to say that if it happens, it would be hugely satisfying and the fulfillment of a long-time dream.

1 comment:

  1. Aww, see the new thing I learned about you from your blog? I had no idea you started off as a journalist!

    I think it's wonderful you may be getting the opportunity to circle back to your first career love. Doing what you love is not a pipedream fantasy; it may not be in the form you thought it would be, but it can happen.

    For me, I love solving problems and organizing, in all kinds of forms: from puzzles and logic problems, to packing the car for trips, to handling all the home projects and finances, to rearranging my closet for the hundredth time :), to figuring out how to integrate a person's work process into the software application they need to use. I find ways, in every job I have, to utilize that skill and passion. And I gravitate toward jobs where that is the bulk of the job description; being a writer or a chef or a photographer or a stockbroker, etc, isn't as suited to my skills as doing what I do now. I loved sales, for instance, but my heart wasn't in it. My heart is in it now. :)

    Anyway, my point is: go for it, and good luck!

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