In some ways, stepping back in to the newsroom at Lakeland This Week feels like getting the band back together.
There’s a lot of familiar faces, and familiar stories – the editorial below my first ever column back in 2018 when it was the St. Paul Journal is about a possible postal strike. But in other ways, it’s a new band entirely.
There are new faces in the newsroom, new workflows, and new technology to adapt to. Not to mention my entourage at home has expanded significantly – instead of a husband, a rambunctious toddler and an equally energetic puppy, I now have four kids ages seven and under - and a middle-aged dog recovering from knee surgery. Same husband, mostly. He got very in to hunting last year and has talked incessantly about it ever since.
I’m still the secretary on the Town of St. Paul Municipal Library Board, but I’ve also added Treasurer for St. Paul Friends of Playschool Society, and “Sign Lady” for the St. Paul Cathedral to my volunteer extra curriculars. (I don’t think I have an official title, but I update the electronic sign on main street.)
Town and County councils have both turned over a few times since I started reporting on the radio back in 2014, but the willingness of our local elected officials to take and return phone calls continues to be appreciated.
When I started in the newsroom, I covered all beats at all hours. In between maternity leaves I moved to the sales department and found part-time hours were the right balance for my busy family, but I missed reporting.
All year, I said to my husband that if God wanted me in the newsroom there would be a part-time job during school hours - and if there wasn’t, it would be my sign that I was meant to stay home and raise babies for a while. And now I feel like his favourite child, because here I am.
The band is back together, and it still rocks.