The best damn job in the whole damn world

I admit it. There are days that I hate this job.

The Luddites blind to multimedia and progress, industry uncertainty, unspoken quotas, insulting readers, ignorant commenters, territorial and overworked writers, interminable meetings, listless editors, writing about other people's misfortune and pain, schmoozing and playing the game in exchange for information. Who doesn't?

But there are days I wonder if I could do anything else, not being a nine-to-fiver and all.

Those are the days of late risings and flexible schedules, 1A centerpieces and scoops, poignant interviews, e-mailed and spoken thanks from tearful story subjects, sitcom-ish newsroom banter, the smell of the first run at 11 p.m., being the gatekeeper, knowing before the world knows.

Those are the days that get me through the next.

Full days juggling photo assignments, meetings, interviews and scheduling, ringing phones, streams of e-mails, deadlines, blog entries. And craft. In the end, there is always the craft. In the end, I get paid to write.

In the end, I must get excited by the industry's technological changes rather than fearful for my job and my future in it. In the end, there is always the beginning:

"One of my editors at the Sun-Times once asked me, "Roger, is it true that they used to let reporters smoke at their desks?" This wasn't asked yesterday; it must have been ten years ago. I realized then, although I'm only writing about it now, that a lifestyle had disappeared. When I entered the business in the autumn of my 16th year, newspapering seemed the most romantic and exciting thing I could possibly do with my life. "But honey," my mom said, "they don't pay them anything." Who cared? It involved knowing what was going on before anyone else did, and putting my byline on top of a story telling it to the world. "Roger Ebert" is only a name. "By Roger Ebert" are the three most magical words in the language, drawing my eye the same way a bulls-eye attracts an arrow."
- Roger Ebert in The Best Damn Job in the Whole Damn World

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