by Mick Rhodes | editor@claremont-courier.com

This week marks 10 years for me here at the Claremont Courier.

Over that time I’ve written hundreds of columns, hundreds more stories and obituaries, edited more than 10,000 individual bits of writing, and consumed a metric ton of coffee.

I was 52, sweaty, and a little nervous when I wrote my first Courier story about the Webb Schools’ Alf Museum in March 2016. I’d been away from journalism for 22 years, but muscle memory kicked in and I managed a passable if overly verbose bit of fluff. It was far from memorable, but it was a start.

Though journalism was in my blood, my last byline had appeared in 1994. Back then the industry was on the cusp of the first of many convulsions brought on by this new thing called the internet. It was uncharted territory for journalism and journalists. The new technology had already begun siphoning off advertising dollars and there was talk of reporters losing their jobs and newspapers shutting down.

By the time I walked into the Courier offices in 2016 the ominous gloom seen just offshore back then had enveloped an entire industry, reshaping how and where everyone got their information. What were whispers in 1994 — that this newfangled internet thing would put small market and second and third tier big city dailies out of business — had not only come to pass (farewell to thee, Rocky Mountain News, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Tampa Tribune, and thousands of local newspapers), it had become the primary topic of discussion in this and most other newsrooms. The everyday chatter wasn’t just about how we were going to be better, but on “How are we going to survive?”

It turned out I’d jumped ship when the iceberg had just come into view and climbed back aboard when the vessel was taking on water and listing alarmingly. And unfortunately the industry has only slipped further below the surface over the past decade, shedding thousands of jobs and of newspapers.

The 118-year-old Claremont Courier has not been immune. We’ve made do with fewer and fewer resources. When I started as a part-time entertainment reporter in 2016 our full-time editorial staff included an editor, a city reporter, a features and education reporter, and a photographer. Today our staff is one full-time reporter and me. That’s it. That’s the crew that brings you your news every week, and we’re still winning state journalism awards every year.

All this whining and bragging isn’t a sales pitch, nor am I’m fishing for sympathy or compliments. It’s just that if I am taking an honest look back at my decade at the Courier, the business side has to be part of the conversation.

And though my job has mutated and is more difficult today, I remain exceedingly grateful; grateful to have a job in print journalism — an industry I often compare to an eight track tape factory, producing a product only afficionados and die-hards love and appreciate; grateful for the freedom to write for an audience and provide news and information for folks who would otherwise be living in a news desert. It’s been a great privilege and responsibility, and I hope I and the Courier will stay at it for years to come.

Much has changed outside of journalism as well. My youngest kids have somehow become 23, 20, and 16. My free time is no longer spent volunteering in elementary school classrooms, watching them frolic at playgrounds, or on fun day trips to the beach. This change has also been a bit of a cataclysm, as I loved all that stuff. But there are new parenting joys to be had, they’re just not as easily accessible as they once were. Such is life.

When I started this job the losses I’d experienced — my father, grandparents, other family members and a few friends — felt somewhat natural. But now like most everyone my age I feel loss all around me. My mother died in 2017. My best friend died suddenly in January. In between I’ve lost the entire line of older family members and way too many friends. I know it’s a thing: you get old and people die with increasing frequency. But I’m not getting used to it. I’m not numb to it. It still hurts, this dying stuff. I used to wonder why once vibrant older people withdrew and got sad, but I get it now: it’s frightening when your family and friends start disappearing.

But the world keeps turning; it’s a confounding, infuriating mess and is currently on fire, but still it turns. I can’t with a straight face say it can’t get any worse — it seems every day brings a new low — but I do have faith that the up-and-comers will bring good change. Young leaders who don’t yet owe anybody anything are popping up all around us. They’re the bright lights we need to follow if our grandkids are to live in a safe, equitable, and prosperous country. Either that or they’ll just have to get used to whatever this is, with the billionaire Epstein class enjoying the spoils of its unchecked greed, lawlessness and cruelty, and the rest of us picking up the tab at best, and at worst simply cannon fodder for their military and economic misadventures.

I know my generation has blown it, and I’m sorry to say I am less hopeful today than I was in 2016. But I know a lot can happen in 10 years and I refuse to surrender to hopelessness. I see great promise in the 20- and 30-somethings out in the street organizing and running for office, and I plan on being here to support them.

Perhaps there is hope, both in the big picture and in our little eight-track tape factory. We shall see.