I had a lot of neat adventures back in the late 80’s working as a reporter for the Whitley Republican in Williamsburg, Kentucky. There was always something going on in that little mountain town.
Sometimes a little weirdness going on, but interesting nonetheless.
One experience in particular is still dear to my heart – the day we went up into the mountains to do a feature on mules hauling pipeline. My friend and newspaper comrade, Teresa, recently found a copy of that article and sent it to me. Reading it again brought back a lot of memories.
When nothing else works – bring in the mules.
A company working to lay pipeline in the Kentucky mountains were not able to take the big trucks into the area where they needed to go. So the foreman had the bright idea to take mules up there to help do the job. It still kinda fascinates me.
The newspaper photographer, Bill, got wind of the story and off we went to find them. We had to drive a little way up in the mountains. When we got there, we found it just as we’d heard – mules were doing the work where trucks couldn’t. It stands as my favorite experience from my time at the paper. (Well, that and getting free supper every Tuesday night at the Bonanza steakhouse. But that’s another story.)
I interviewed the foreman (and the mules ?), and Bill took lots of photos – it turned out to be a very nice feature spread and we also won photo feature of the year, and feature article of the year from the Kentucky Weekly Newspaper Association. Cool beans.
I moved on from newspaper work, but never forgot my love of writing about everyday life – neat stories about people, places and things.
In the back of my mind, I missed newspaper life and thought that I would like to do that again. I wanted my own publication, though. Then I heard about the One Christian Voice network of online news sites.
I messaged the editor of Nashville Christian Voice and found out that they were looking for someone to start another site in Tennessee.
Pick me! Pick me!
Long story short – I’m now the editor of my own news site, ETN Christian Voice! I’ve been slow out of the gate, but it’s coming along. I get to choose the stories to feature, I’m writing about the things I love to write about and my dream is happening.
Don’t ever let go of your dreams. They’re there for a reason.
Keep moving forward and do what you know to do. Pray, give your plans and dreams to God and He will take it from there.
Have faith.
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1
Connie,
So among your many other talents you are a mule whisperer! Who knew? Congrats on the connection to One Christian Voice! So now you are an editor, it means you can teach at conference, right? : )
ha ha! I don’t know if anyone would want me to teach! I might have people submitting stories about all kinds of off-the-wall stuff?But then again … hmmm..