My very first assignment was given to me at the Voice open house in late August 2005, in which I was tasked to cover how the Scot Marching Band had decided to forgo the traditional costume of tartan shirts and replace them with T-shirts with a tartan stripe on them instead. The lead borrowed the townís slogan, ìKeeping tradition a part of the future.”
Later that week Hurricane Katrina made landfall.In one of many semantic arguments I had with the other staff, I insisted on describing the displaced as ìrefugees” and that casting the governmentís response as criminally anemic was an objective way of describing what was going on. How foolish of me.
It was this intersection of the everyday with the bigger things happening in the outside world that brought out the magic here, like the time I ìcovered” an anti-war demonstration at Liberty and Market about a month later, with a makeshift ìpress” card in my volunteer do-rag, and went around asking people about what was going on in Mesopotamia. Some of the demonstrators were World War II veterans; one told me that we Americans need to learn that we canít go around fighting for someone elseís country.
Activism made its appearance for me in its own time, in the form of an idiosyncratic group of some friends that revolved around socializing the distribution of ice cream. It grew from there. One time we raised a few hundred dollars to help aid agencies in Sudan under the cover of an ice cream social outside Kenarden. But I was born to be a journo, whether or not that got any respect. Aspiring to effect social change took a secondary place, Iím afraid.
So it may be needless to say ó Iíll say it anyway ó that The Wooster Voice played a huge role in my college years and Iíll miss everybody who made it possible. Iíll dearly miss all my fellow tribesmen at Hillel; and if youíre reading this, Rabbi Joan, you donít know how much I will miss our conversations and company.
At the top of this issue it says, ìA student publication since 1883.” Thatís because about three years ago, at the prompting of on-and-off top editor Liz Miller, we rummaged through the Voice archives as they appeared circa the late 1960s and quietly changed our masthead back to ìa student publication” from the supplicating phrase ìserving The College of Wooster.” Liz and I felt that the Voice served the students. I donít think anyone ever noticed the change.
As a final note, Iím genuinely angry and saddened at the demise of newspapers. But at least I can say Iíve worked on one for the past four years, as an editor and columnist and occasional staff writer.
I might not get that opportunity again. But as the real world is about to hit me, Iím pretty confident someone out there wants me to write for them.