Why I don't talk about work

So, y'all may have noticed that I rarely talk about my job here. There are very good reasons for that:

• First, I don't hide my posts — anything I say here, I'd be comfortable saying to folks at work (even though I'm pretty sure none of them know the address of my blog), and that's pretty important to me. Those of you who have met me in real life know that I sometimes have, for lack of a better, less psychobabble term, boundary issues: sometimes I push for closeness that is unwarranted and, in the long-run, regrettable. So, keeping everything I post here public means that I am accountable for everything I say. It also means that, any time I do feel like going beyond the pale on topics, they're pretty damn-well thought out; I'm not about to rant or write a narrative about something that doesn't have some importance to me.
• Second, to paraphrase something my boss said today, "We journalists are at our best when the world is at its worst." Sadly, this is very true: for every front page I've done that helped a 98-year-old woman cut through bureaucratic bullshit to get a passport or celebrated a silly charity event that had pillars of the community kissing camels, I've had countless fatals, homicides, drug busts, sexual assaults and corrupt cops to fill out the balance sheet. True, I don't write the stories, but I do sit there staring at a blank page thinking, "Hello, World, here's a little snippet of history; it may not be important next week but, right now, it's the most important thing there is: How do I make you realize that?" You can see how that, with all its obvious distaste as well as undertones, wouldn't be a very fitting subject for posts, no?

However, today I feel like I did some pretty good work, even if it is along negative lines:

There it is, the top half of today's front page; a somewhat smaller version of what you would see if you walked by one of our newsracks and were debating whether what was contained inside was worth your hard-earned 50 cents. Click on it to get the larger version. Or don't; it may be old news by the time you read this.

I argued with myself about whether or not the stories presented there were a big enough deal to warrant the banner, ALL CAPS "screamer" headline with the abutting centered subheads. But the more I looked at that stockbroker's eyes, the more I thought about his kids' college funds going down the drain. And the less I cared about the weaknesses my bosses would inevitably find in what I'd done.

Personally? That's some good work up there. That is — minus the ghastly, drop-shadow bedecked masthead — some New York Times shit.

And, perversely, I'm glad that the global media seems to be bearing my opinion on this story's import out.

Oh, hey, just to end on a clever/funny note, I did manage to get one joke "above the fold," as we like to say in the journalism business. It's kind of obscure for your average Aikenite, maybe, but I've got high hopes for you folks.

Did you catch it?