Four really good people

I don’t consider myself a “news junkie” but I do consider myself well informed. For the record, I consider a “news junkie” to be someone who is obsessed with news to the point where it’s all they think or talk about. I like sports and American Idol too much to be that obsessed.

So being well informed, I am inundated every day with bad news: the economy and jobs keep going south, oil prices are going back up and tragically, a beautiful young model from Brazil had both her hands and feet amputated only to die from the disease necrosis. I’m no doctor but the way it has been described, it seems like she didn’t get the best care she might have somewhere else. Tragic.

But push that all aside as I want to get out from under the doom and tell you about four really good people. I had the privilege of having lunch last Saturday with some current and former SU students: Melissa Morton, her boyfriend Steve Wanzik, current SU students Steve Andress and Torie Wells. What makes them “really good people?” Well first off, the fact they got up before noon on a Sunday to have lunch with me for one. Second, they are thoughtful, engaging and funny people. Third, they are working to pursue their dreams and are having success.

Torie is a reporter and producer for the ABC News bureau here at Newhouse in addition to working part-time here at OTN as well as going back on occasional weekends to work at the Fox affiliate in her hometown of Albany. Steve Andress called the play by play for a portion of the Syracuse/Pittsburgh basketball game last Monday on ESPN. Yup, that’s right, ESPN. Steve Wanzik is working for a small radio station near Philadelphia doing news and play by play of high school sports. His boss? The Philadelphia icon and play-by-play announcer of the Eagles, Merrill Reese. And Melissa is a special education teacher at a Philadelphia charter school doing at least four preps and co-teaching with the other teachers for those preps. If you know anything g about teaching, more than prep is hard, co-teaching is harder and doing all that in your first job while taking graduate classes is harder still.

The next time I start my day by being “well informed” and proceed to devour more doom and gloom, I shall remember my lunch with Melissa, Steve, Torie and Steve, four really good people making a difference.

Happy New Year!

I’ve been trying to zero in on what I should blog about after my absence. My holiday break? All the fun and exciting things we did at OTN this past semester and what we have planned for the spring? Andy Rautins knee?

I don’t think so.

I think I’d rather tell you how I feel today.

Mostly I’m anxious. I’m anxious about this economy. Coming to work everyday with NPR is like listening to a doctor when he comes into the examining room with the test results. Will it be bad news or good news?

The Dow goes up. It goes down. More people are laid off from a company and there’s another stimulus package being planned. It seems like when we get a really lousy piece of news; another follows it.

And I’m anxious for you, the students. How many of you are being impacted by this? I’m guessing that your family is feeling this in some way too which has to trickle down to you. If you’re about to graduate this May, you must be worried that getting that first job will be twice as hard as it was last year. And with those loans to pay off, I imagine you have concerns.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about my father and his generation lately. Pop was born in 1916 and grew up during the Great Depression. When he was 25 the United States entered World War II. Compared to him and his generation, we’ve had kind of an easy time of things. But I’ve been trying to imagine what he was thinking with all the upheaval his generation was going through? They certainly didn’t ask for those troubles but they were handed to them nonetheless. Did it make them feel as powerless as it makes me feel today?

I played by the rules here, lived within my means, saved some money, worked hard at my job and tried to live a decent life. And it has all been upended by greed. And I never saw it coming. I guess I feel something else today, a little anger. I’m a little p@#$ed that there are people who knew that what they were doing was wrong but kept on doing it for their own rewards, not caring how it would impact the rest of us.

But then I think of my father. I never asked him how he felt about being handed such a lousy hand of cards in his early life. But based on his life, I’m guessing he did what we’re all trying to do, just trying to live a good, decent and fulfilling life.

I’m really glad Andy Rautins knee is okay, maybe that’s a sign of things to come.