Yearly Retrspective (09-10-07)

It all began with a birthday party. My son was turning seven and we invited a few friends for the usual cake, ice cream, and pin-the-tail. Only something different happened, before the party even began.

One of the parents, after dropping off their child, pulled me aside to ask me what I was going to do about something called, “Freshmen Initiation.”

Over the next week, after learning all the facts and talking with students, I decided to do something I felt I could do reasonably well: I decided to write about the issue.

I have always enjoyed writing. While I often doubt the quality of what I put to paper, I enjoy the process of putting words together in a feeble effort to capture the thoughts in my head.

I consider writing to be my one true hobby. Some people golf, or hunt, or fish, or knit, or cook, or work on their yards. I write. As the demands of my professional and personal life increased, my time for this hobby steadily decreased. I used to write songs and poetry and short stories. After the birth of our son, I wrote a two-act play where I tried to capture the comedy of the experience. Later, I penned two short young adult novels. Then, I enrolled in graduate school and my weekends were spent scouring textbooks for enough content to meet the grading requirements of some ten page paper or another.

And now, I make time every Sunday evening to compose these short perspectives, and I can say that of everything I have ever written, I am the most satisfied with these principal perspectives.

This column is my fifty-third in the series. It all began one year ago, and last week I composed one full year worth of writing. While this doesn’t rank with my marriage, or children, or even with the honor of getting hired by USD 281, I am still proud of myself for sticking with it. All of my other writing has been so inconsequential compared to these columns. In the past, my writing was a selfish act, done simply as a way to amuse myself. But now I write for an entirely different purpose. Now, I write for an audience.

Thus, I can take very little credit for my success at writing a weekly column. The credit for my ability to find something to write about each week really goes to all the kind people who have stopped me on almost a weekly basis to pass encouragement for my efforts. The credit goes to the parents who thanked me for my article about Freshmen Initiation, or the guy who stopped me Dollar General to thank me for my column on cell phones, or to Bert at the hardware store who always is so generous with the compliments. The credit goes to my mother and sister who now subscribe to the Hill City Times and regularly find something nice to say. I never meant to make mom cry, but I can’t say that it doesn’t thrill me to see that my work is so appreciated. The credit goes to the teachers and coaches who have clipped out my perspectives and hung them on bulletin boards or discussed them in class. The credit goes to those who have taken the time to do a little writing of their own, in the form of thank you notes and letters of appreciation.

Of course, most the credit for my fifty-two articles goes to my wonderful wife. She not only has read and commented about everything I’ve written, but she also presented me with a wonderful scrapbook of all my newspaper clippings.

For a writer, there is nothing like seeing you name and your words in actual print. Not just on a computer screen, or printed from a computer printer, but type-set and published for all the world to read. For that service, I must thank Jim Logbeck, Diane and Bob Boyd, and everyone at the Times. You have given me a reason to write, and you have helped keep my little hobby alive.

As proud as I am for not missing a week in the last year, I am equally excited about the future. As long as people read what I have to say, I will keep putting what I have to say in the paper. Here’s to another fortuitous year in wonderful Hill City, Kansas.