Lessons from a journalist

On assignment, 1999

When I took Mark Wood’s advice, I had no idea it would impact more than my career.

Mark was my work-study supervisor. When I asked him what was the best way to become a good writer, he said, “Spend a few years in a newsroom.”

As I began reporting for a hometown daily, I wondered what I’d gotten myself into—mercurial editors, deadlines measured in minutes and colleagues addicted to red proofreader pens. And did I mention the crazy hours and appalling pay? Mark was right, though; I was learning how to write quickly and with confidence.

When I finally turned in my reporter’s notebook, to my surprise the lessons from the newsroom kept on coming. Each one enriched how I saw the world around me and communicated with others. With deep gratitude, I share the following:

• Be a good listener. Say less and listen more.

• Ask questions that don’t lead to a simple yes/no answer. When you avoid these types of questions, you’ll receive deeper, richer answers.

• Show genuine interest in others and their stories.

• Be persistent. The truth you seek is out there. You just might need to look for it behind an unexpected door.

• Even though five people have checked an article, don’t be surprised if you see a typo while reading the paper over your coffee the next morning. Mistakes happen. Once you’ve done all you can, learn from them but move forward. In the newsroom, we run a note apologizing for the error. It’s always appropriate to apologize briefly and sincerely then move forward with a plan that will help you do a better job next time.

• Expect feedback, and expect criticism. Lots of it. Expect you won’t make everyone happy and won’t be popular with everyone.

• Surround yourself with people who are passionate about what they do and who love sharing what they know.

• Go out and seek your own answers—don’t wait for others to tell you what to do and think. 

• Notice the details. That's where the good stuff is.

• Always try to look at familiar things in a new way.

Maybe that’s what Mark had in mind, that being a good writer is more than knowing where to put your commas. It’s about being able to put your heart in the right place.

In addition to Mark, I dedicate this posting to Seabee journalists past, present and future; it’s been an honor to work with each of you.

Which of your jobs has had the most impact on you and why?

Book review: The Road to Makokota

Last week something amazing occurred for only the third time in our 13-year marriage—my husband and I read and gave five-star reviews to the same book.

I knew something was up when Marcelo stopped in on his way to work to pick up the copy I had reserved at our local library. When he came home that evening, I saw a piece of paper inserted about 30 pages into the novel.

“What’s with that?” I asked, pointing.

“I thought I’d read just a few words during my lunch break,” he said. “Now I can’t put it down! Do you mind waiting until I’ve had a chance to finish reading the book?”

I was more than intrigued. Marcelo almost never reads fiction, unless it is well researched and written with truth. Having read the book twice, once by myself and a second time to discuss its subtleties with Marcelo, I know that The Road to Makokota (Stephen Barnett, MacAdam/Cage Publishing, 2004) is both.

Set in present-day West Africa, the book’s protagonist is in danger from the first page—from himself and those around him. Craig Allan Hammond has returned to the country, where he built a road 16 years earlier, to search for the woman and child he left behind. Hammond had been able to keep track of them through the letters Kuyateh, an old friend, sent to the States, one every year. Now even those have stopped, and civil war is tearing the country apart.

For the last decade and a half, Hammond has been living in trailers, moving every couple of years and working jobs that don’t mean anything to him. He drinks too much, he smokes too much and he’s known too many women but not enough love. When his mother dies, it hits him—leaving is the only thing he’s gotten good at.

Consumed with fear, guilt and shame, Hammond needs to find Oussumatu Turay and their son, Abu, and bring them out of the killing zone to safety in order to save himself. But if their fate is similar to other villagers, his son likely has died while fighting with one of the child armies while Oussu was murdered after being brutally tortured and raped.

After several days of searching the refugee camps, Hammond has to accept the offer of one-time diplomat Claude Bayeh to buy passage with a group of gunrunners heading toward Makakota, the village where he last saw Oussu and Abu. His traveling companion is Katya, a Polish nurse who has been working in the camps and has her own secrets to hide.

Hammond doesn’t lose his will or ability to love others, even though he still must learn that you can’t always deny and avoid troubling times, as this is the only way to learn certain lessons and receive the gift of a life now richer in meaning. He also must learn that when you don’t forgive yourself, you also hurt those around you.

Author Stephen Barnett is a master at describing Hammond’s journey in chilling detail, in plotting a narrative that is full of subtleties and symbolism, and of developing layers of meaning that are open to interpretation. Barnett also is gifted with the ability to select the right words to convey a meaning. A sampling of some of the book’s strongest lines includes:

“You think you’re just going to show up in hell, ask a few questions and split?”

“People usually have real simple reasons for doing things. They just make them sound complicated.”

“You can kill a man only once, but you can rob him every day of his life.”

“What you see isn’t necessarily the truth.”

“A man is no more than what he is looking for.”

“Just as a great silk-cotton tree casts a great shadow, a great evil casts a great good.”

“I was afraid of life … (of) who I really was under what everyone thought I was.”

“You are not a believer. You must see and know.”

Barnett’s writing is philosophical, stark and gritty, concise and pithy, and graceful and lyrical. He excels in building suspense while making you think and wonder.

If you like novels with an intense, taut storyline that suggest things—that leave scenes unwritten and things unsaid so that you can grow along with the protagonist—The Road To Makokota is both a gripping novel and highly recommended reading. Its surprise ending will keep you thinking and believing.

About the author

Stephen Barnett was a Peace Corps volunteer in the 1970s Sierra Leone, West Africa, where his experiences as an agricultural extension agent formed the background for The Road To Makokota, his first novel. An Ohio native, Barnett lives in Northern California with his wife and daughter.

Support your local library! Ask for a copy of The Road To Makokota. It’s also available at http://www.amazon.com/Road-Makokota-Stephen-Barnett/dp/1931561605.

What’s the best book you’ve recently read?

Author Stephen Barnett

An unexpected good-luck charm

To help pay for college I worked for a dry cleaner, usually as a seamstress but sometimes on the front counter. One sociable septuagenarian always waited until the Monday morning rush ended before placing his carefully folded laundry and mending on the Formica counter. This spring day he looked extra chipper.

“Girls, come here for a minute. I have something to show you. Can you guess what it is?”

A spherical, brown object rested on his palm. “I’m not sure. Is it some kind of nut?” my co-worker Bobbie asked.

“You guessed,” he smiled. “You know, a lot of us old timers believe buckeyes bring good luck. Here, I want each of you to have one.”

Reluctantly I stuffed the nut into a front jeans pocket. Before driving home for lunch, I tossed the thing into a back corner of my glove box.

A few months later I was updating my insurance card. Bumping against something smooth, I pulled out the all-but-forgotten seed. It glowed like dark jade. Serenity filled me as my right thumb glided over the glossy surface of a natural indentation. When I shut the glove box, the nut was back inside.

After graduation I was offered a job as a newspaper reporter. Traveling home from a late-night assignment on roads slicked with ice, I tried not to think about the rock-filled ravine that was deeper than a seven-story building. The tires started sliding.

Listing toward the passenger side, I saw the glove box. OK, buckeye, let’s see if you really work, I muttered. I stopped with three wheels on the road.

Headlights glared as a truck pulled over and a well-bundled figure came toward me. A trusted neighbor had been out checking his cattle and helped push my car to safety.

A few years later I married and accepted a position at a Northern California newspaper. That winter my new hometown experienced one of its worst floods in history. Road blocks detoured traffic through the two-foot waves.

I longed for the comfort of a favorite CD, but I’d left it in the glove box—along with the buckeye. Reaching the office, I learned I was one of the few able to report for work that night.

Flooding is not the only concern for California motorists. Even worse are the thick, low-lying Tule fogs, the leading cause of the state’s weather-related casualties.

Creeping onto the road just before dawn, I could feel the asphalt, but I couldn’t see the stripes. I couldn’t see the shoulder. Minutes felt like hours.

By the time I reached the newsroom I was a disoriented bundle of nerves. Walking to my desk, I heard the impersonal voice of the police scanner. A multi-car pile up with fatalities had been reported on the causeway bridge of Interstate 5.

Our top photographer came running over to ask if I wanted to take my vehicle or his. I didn’t think Tod’s car came equipped with a buckeye, so I volunteered my seven-year-old two door. Exiting the parking lot, I looked at the glove box. Returning to file my story, I patted its door in thanks.

A few months later a piece of paper would have a similar impact on me.

Covering a news story involving a serial rapist had caused me to doubt myself and my skills. Sitting in the kitchen at our old oak table, I stared out the window, ignoring the beauty of the newly planted grapevines.

My husband sat next to me and silently picked up my notebook and pen. Marcelo returned the pad so it faced me. Looking down I saw seven words.

“Believe in yourself—you have my love.”

That evening I cut out the words, which filled a three-inch strip of lined paper. Folding it carefully in half, I slipped the note into my billfold. Ten years later, it still is there. And the buckeye? It no longer is in the glove box of my old Chevrolet.

It now rides in a Toyota Corolla.

What is your good-luck charm and why?