Struggles with being the newbie

As many of you know, normally I welcome new and challenging obstacles. They’re like ‘a breakfast of champions’ of sorts; hot cereal with apples or strawberries, sprinkled with a bit of sugar because otherwise, let’s face it, it’d be pretty bland even WITH the fruit.

Adjusting, making a mark and everything else that comes with moving about 300 miles away from everything you know, cherish and have come to build extremely solid relationships with is never an easy task. As I mentioned in a previous post, it’s even more of a challenge in a small-town (I still refuse to call this location a city) where every body knows your name…well except for mine.

I thought people not knowing my name would be a perk. The bars that I had to avoid because of the people I didn’t want to run into? Never more. Alas, people not knowing my name equates to not getting the story.

Case in point. The shooting on April 9 on James and West streets. My name is on that forsaken article. The six or seven lines that fill up what can only be called a brief. I waited on the scene for about 30-45 minutes hoping to talk to the chief about the situation. What did I get? An officer who came over and told me the chief wouldn’t be releasing any information. The chief himself didn’t even bother to come over.

Once I got back to my car and started driving away, I had my regrets. It’s like when you get in a fight and are left speechless. I was never the quick one in a verbal draw. I normally come up with the good lines about 5-10 minutes after the fact. The same goes for this situation, only I was left wondering: Should I have gone over and at least introduced myself?

I don’t think there was a right answer this question. It could have gone either way. I could have walked over there, pardoned my interruption and introduced myself. It either would have been well-received, or not so much. I’m thinking the latter. I argued myself into thinking the latter. I assume the chief would have talked to me if he had the time…right?

Second case in point. Wednesday, April 13. I was scheduled to cover Spike Lee speaking at Hamilton College. No photographer had been assigned, so I was given the ever-daunting task of using an SLR camera to snap some decent photos to quickly send via Verizon wireless connection capabilities on a laptop given to me for the assignment. The catch? While I’d used an SLR before (I have one in my own possession) I’m not well-versed in the mechanics. The second catch? I also had to write a short article, which required paying attention to the speech itself.

While there are many different models, this gives you an idea of what an SLR camera is.

For those of you unfamiliar with SLR cameras, which I found some reporters even were unfamiliar with (which gave me a faint glimmer of hope that maybe I canbring something to the table), they’re a bit different from a regular point and shoot.

Long story short, I had several different issues with using the camera ranging from it not taking pictures at all to it not taking clear pictures. Then the Verizon wireless card wouldn’t connect (somehow I always seem to have issues with Verizon, no matter what the case). In the end, the photo editor had to come down and take the pictures, while I haphazardly wrote an article based off of the mid-to-tail-end of the speech.

While all the editors weren’t upset and reminded me it wasn’t my fault (there should have been a photographer there), it was my one chance to prove to the bigwigs that I could do something that required a bit more challenge than driving to a location and telling an editor what I see, i.e. house in flames on the corner of such-and-such street. This desire comes from deep within to prove that I can be something more than just the fall-back reporter for the articles that no one else wants to cover.

As the newbie, I am truly at the bottom rung of the ladder, and at times, barely able to hang on. Sometimes I wonder if someone will be stomping on my fingers in hopes of me falling off completely.

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