Trolling the Waters

I am not a patient person. My parents will readily attest to my glaring lack of attention span when faced with any lecture that extends beyond 20-minutes. (Although they might find me more attentive if they veered away from the topic of my myriad flaws.) I cannot abide sitting still. If a movie’s pacing drags, I’m gone. If food takes too long to prepare, I reach for a granola bar. If a professor wanders, so do I.

Which makes reporting on meetings, speeches and news conferences a particular challenge for me.

Apart from the obvious challenge of staying awake, the news value of these events isn’t immediately apparent. Whereas events like a car crash, a workers strike or a murder, have direct and blatant news value, the reporter must glean through a lot of tripe in order to find what’s truly newsworthy in a speech.

The same holds true for news releases. Judd Slivka, reporter for the Arizona Republic claims to receive over 400 pieces of mail a week and manage to pull seeds for real stories from the torrent. I cannot imagine having the time, let alone the patience and eye to do that. As stated in “News Reporting and Writing,” news releases are more often than not, “far from earthshaking.” I hear that and already my eyes start glazing over.

When I was little, my dad and I used to fish in our pond. It was an ordeal that involved me throwing rocks to see the ripples, trying to catch frogs, running around in circles, dipping my toe in to see how cold the water was and generally not fishing. My dad would sit in the grass, reeling in his line, waiting.

I can only hope to do the same when the time comes.