Tired, But Still Worth It

Just finished work day number 5 of what will be 10 straight. Six of them include my second job. I just hope that by the end of it, my ass can catch up to me as I will be going into 10 straight days OFF! and I want my ass to enjoy it with me. I need something to lay on while I enjoy my freedom from work, and freedom from marriage. This week I received the paperwork that officially declared the marital chain destroyed. The chain that tethered me to a very uncomfortable 19 year relationship.

During the average newsgathering day, a reporter, or reporter/photographer team will gather two stories. On most weekends, the lone hunter/gatherer, in our case, the photographer, will scrape up three or four stories. For me, Saturday was brought by the number 4. Three local stories, and one that required an hour and a half drive to the coast. I will never complain about having to go to the water--especially the ocean. Yes, even if hurricane Shaniqua is bitching her way into the coastline, I will still be there with my goggles, shorts and aqua socks to say:"ok, gimme sexy!" or, "you're a tiga" and paw at it. I've been sandblasted by every one of those swirlies since '96. Her name was Bertha.

Anyway, this time the water was covered with boats of all sizes, and some of them had cannons that were fired. Blanks of course. It was the re-enactment of when, in 1747 some bold Spanish pirates came into Beaufort, the oldest harbor in the state. They were met by some locals who put together a milita, and defeated the invaders. The event gave many an excuse to dress up like they might be going to a halloween shindig. Lots of people really got into it, and had a great time. I went into the day charged with making a long format nat sound package out of it. By the time I could legally park the car and walk several blocks to get to the action, it had already begun, and there wasn't enough ingredients to make a delicious nat pkg. We settled for a 30 second VO. Not much for three hours of driving, but sometimes, that will be the price of broadcasting an interesting event. And it reinforces a big reason why I do what I do: access.

Economic Manifestation

I don't know how the rest of the country is managing to tread water in this sea of economic turbulence, but here in eastern Nawf Cack I've noticed a couple of trends. The most notable being the escalation of  crime. It usually involves drugs. If not, then it's a violent crime committed against a family member (but even then it may still be about drugs). It seems more people have been shot this year than any other. Some of the victims happened to exist in the fringes of the darkness that is a perpetrator's realm. Like the two people killed earlier this month in downtown Greenville who were standing in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Most victims have immersed themselves in that darkness, rolled the bones every day, and eventually came up with snake eyes. Arguably, this demographic favors the young, black male. Thus, many of these, in their over-sized clothes and hats are stereotyped. I spoke with an African-American city council member the other day after a meeting with downtown business owners. They were trying to come up with solutions to the violence inherent with a large cluster of alcohol-serving establishments in proximity to a university. She was upset at how her nephew, who dresses like a thug is treated like a thug. She insisted he is not.  She is one of several narrow-minded politicians in this county who are quite comfortable with their head in the sand.

The other trend I noticed today while driving an hour south to cover a news event. Yard sales. They have cropped up this season like clovers. They come in all sizes too. Some you can wander through the entire yard and into the house, some are simply a man leaning against the back of his car with two items laid out in front of him with a sign that reads: "YARD SALE". I must have come across at least 30 of these "sales" in my hour drive. People are trying to get rid of all the crap they've collected. Whether it was useful at some point, or it was handed down, it no longer has a use in their lives, and their hoping it can be handy to somebody.

Some sell personal items, some sell euphoric diversions. One is benevolent, the other is not.

Flea Powder, anyone?

One of the many axioms thrown around in the South is:"You take the fleas with the dog." In my line of work as a news photographer, we occasionally come across people who either don't know what the purpose of local news is, or don't care. And if they can convince a green newsdesk to send someone out to their "event", then they can abuse the fourth estate, and they win.

Thursday night, by the assumed power of a "press release", I was sent to cover an "event". I don't know what the desk was thinking after hopefully reading said release, but they thought it was some kind of seminar, freeing people of financial burdens. "Leveling the playing field and getting rid of financial illiteracy, " was the mantra in the release and the female in charge of the seminar. And she said that exact phrase six times in the 20 minutes I spent there. The desk assumed it would be a well-attended event. It wasn't.

My plan was to arrive 15 minutes early so I could get my sound bite, then shoot the seminar and leave when I have my 40 seconds of video. There were four people with this group, and only one person showed up to see what it was about. It was to get people to pay these people to have a "personal concierge" at their beck and call, 24/7. If one had questions of any kind, all they have to do is call their personal assistant and they would do the digging and get back to you in minutes. It was a get rich quick scheme for the person who wrote the "release". So there I was in a conference room with these four people watching this one person look at a video presentation on a laptop. Feeling like a cheap whore, I started walking out. The leader stopped me at the door and wanted my personal cell number. Nice try, but HELL NO.

 

In this small TV market, with VERY little to feed a hungry news machine, our desk will take just about anything at face value. So yes, there are actually two problems here. But, there are fleas that some dogs just can't shake.