Why I drink ... phone calls.

Excellent advice!


How about these calls: "We have a big game/event this weekend that we'd like you to write about to help us with publicity. Please call back today at" and they leave a number. No name, maybe the name of the event and the attitude of urgency.

Why? Because they waited until two or three days before their event to get something going with the local media. Then their supposed urgency is to be translated into you dropping everything to rush to help them. If you don't, they go higher up to editors or complain to anyone they know.

I had a trade show promoter get irate once when I showed up at the event to look around for a story for the next day's paper. He was pissed that I had not done anything to "help him promote it" earlier in the week. When I said maybe he should have contacted me instead of taking me for granted, he backed off.

Some people have no sense of long-range planning.

 

When I worked at a weekly, the local water polo club asked if we could take photos of their weekend tournament. I asked them to send me results. They said they would. We took photos. They sent results ... a month later. No, I'm not kidding, a f'ing MONTH later along with a wrapup of all their other summer activities.

 

When I was in high school I took sports incredibly seriously. Losing a game on a Friday pretty much ruined my weekend. More than one girl stopped dating me because I was miserable to be around after losing. But I can't remember ever once getting upset about anything that was in the paper.

I got one of those "my daughter is devastated about what you wrote" calls early in my career and said something to the kid the next day. She had no idea what I was talking about.

At my old job I used to get a lot of messages that went something like: "I was reading the paper this morning and I'd like you to call me at 555-1234 as soon as possible." No name, no explanation as to why I need to call.

 

I don't mind getting crazy calls from parents ... unless they happen to be right.

Those are the worst.

 

A couple weeks ago, a guy from our area, who was one of the better high school basketball players of his generation, died. He had gotten a scholarship to a Division I program, but didn't play a lot in his four years there. But he was a member of the school's Final Four team in the early 1970s, so a story was certainly warranted. We couldn't come up with another player from our county who had been on a Final Four team.

I assigned the story and our guy -- a 30-year veteran -- spent more than a week chasing down his high school coach and teammates. We'd hoped to get our hands on a photo from the guy's high school days, but that didn't happen. Also, our reporter spent that week trying in vain to reach family members. At that point, we ran the story, which ended up being a nice tribute.

Two days after it ran, the man's wife sends a near-hysterical e-mail to our sportswriter and the department, ripping us for doing the story without the family's approval or consent. Among the trespasses we committed were referring to the guy, via his coach, as being 6-foot-3. He was 6-4, according to the wife, who wrote that she should know, since she'd been with him -- and I quote -- "in more ways than you know, for 35 years." Never mind the fact that it is entirely possible he WAS 6-3 in high school.

The wife also contends that the guy's mother was offended by the fact one of his teammates referred to her son as "a slasher" kind of player. I don't think I need to explain here what the teammate meant. It clearly isn't a slam of any kind.

The e-mail went on and on like this for about three pages, with a litany of accusations of negative comments from the people quoted in the story. This could not be further from the truth. I was flabbergasted. In 25 years of doing this job, I've never received feedback like that about a story that paid tribute to someone.

I've done stories about sports figures who have passed away. I spoke with a 15-year-old high school girl whose father died of a heart attack on the day she was supposed to play in a big game. She couldn't have been more gracious. I spent an hour on the phone with a guidance counselor who was particularly close to a high school wrestler who died in a fire. She apologized profusely for crying as she talked about him. Bottom line is that in both situations, and others like them, I did my best to be as sympathetic and respectful as possible, and the people I was talking to seemed to understand what we were trying to do as a newspaper. Certainly, there were other friends and family members we did not speak with, but nobody lashed out after we published stories about people who had died. In addition, an All-Pro NFL lineman from our area -- a player I'm sure most of you remember -- died during training camp almost 10 years ago. The family was devastated, but never lashed out at us or any other media types.

It's been a few days since that e-mail came, and I still haven't responded. I started to two or three times, but deleted each response. Our writer did the same. We figured nothing we could say was going make that lady feel better or convince her that we neither intended to disrespect her husband, nor had we actually done that at all.

Anybody out there ever have to deal with something like this?

 

Sorta, kinda. A 20-something year old woman was shot to death in town last summer. The family didn't want to talk, but they were gracious about turning me down at least. Months later, I receive in the mail a full-color, full-page picture of the girl with the note "Here is a better picture of our daughter for your files." A little creepy to be sure. I'm guessing they weren't happy with the photo they submitted with her obituary back in July.

 

Calvin: Sounds like its best not to respond. Sounds like lady needed to vent and, unfortunately, you were the target. Let it go. Most of the greivances sound petty, but, the one I don't get in this situation is about needing to ask the family's permission to do a story. Obviously he was a public figure at one time and still well-known in the community, so why the need for "permission"?

 

Exactly my first thought. And it wasn't like our reporter did not make the effort to reach the family. He did. After almost 10 days, we figured they didn't want to be part of the story, so we went with what we had. Which, I have been told by others in the community and my news room, was an excellent story and a fitting tribute.

 

Calvin, it sounds like this woman was (understandably) upset over her husband's death and was lashing out because she was already feeling like she couldn't control what was happening in her life when someone else took it upon themselves to tell her husband's story without her OK. I wouldn't worry about any of it. If other people outside the newsroom thought it was a nice tribute then it probably was.

 

Having read the story to which Calvin refers, it was, as he said, extremely well done.

 

Yes, I'll give a free pass to grieving family members...that's just anguish and grief pouring out at a random target. Sorry it had to be you in this case.

 

Over one period of a couple of weeks, we got a series of calls that I conflated into "Isn't it just typical of the liberal media not to cover middle school lacrosse games?! I was SHOCKED to learn that the coaches were calling the scores into the paper!"

Should point out that we had a staff of five (including the desk) with a mid-major D1 university and roughly 12 nearby high schools to cover.