5-28-21
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Halfway through this semester I was told (and it was told as I had no say in the matter since as an adjunct faculty member, particularly one without an advanced degree, I kind of go where I’m told to go in terms of class assignments) that a recently hired tenure-track professor will be taking the reins as adviser of the California State University, Dominguez Hills student newspaper come the fall semester. Thus endeth my stewardship of the Bulletin, which began in spring, 2018. But I leave the paper in more than capable hands; plus, I’ll be teaching twice as many units in the fall AND I’ll finally be able to finish that master’s degree, which I had to put on hold when asked to advise the paper in the first place.
But it’s still bittersweet. Advising a college paper is a lot of work. But next to being a working journalist (and I still freelance from time to time) nothing comes close to making you feel like one than shepherding aspiring journalists. To see the thrill they get when they first see their name in print, even if that print is an electronic facsimile, since the Bulletin hasn’t had a print edition since March of last year. To watch them transform from having no clue about how to publish a newspaper into owning their part of the process. To have them return and volunteer to remain a part of the staff even if they’ve taken the newspaper production workshop the maximum two times. To see them realize not only the benefits of working for a college newspaper in terms of making them better reporters, writers and editors; but to see how their efforts sustain and build upon the culture of that publication.
And then there’s the reality that being involved with that paper probably did more than anything else to keep me sane the past 15 months. Even during last summer, there was always something to keep me occupied and focused relating to that paper, whether it was archiving past issues or dealing with the website.
But it also helped keep me grounded during a time when everybody was forced into a far downsized social circle, something felt more acutely by unmarried or otherwise unattached people like me with family scattered across the country (although I learned a long time ago the difference between being alone and being lonely). Because I had a solid crew of students who kept wanting to be involved with the paper, even during those summer months. These weren’t students who were new to the newspaper, stuck around one semester, got their grade and moved on. They were as much colleagues as students, albeit ones that had to be reminded from time to time that one uses parentheses in AP Style, NOT BRACKETS!, And I conversed with them far more over the past 15 months than anyone else in my life.
But I don’t think I truly appreciated that until last Friday; nor did I have any idea that I was anything to them other than a technology-averse, grumpy, middle-aged white dude who may have had 30 years of journalism experience, but had spent all that time on the print side, a type of journalism that seems increasingly diminished by every Twitter storm and hedge fun savaging. Even those who have held on can’t be blamed for wondering how long they will be relevant in a field that,in the words of Jill Lepore, “is as addled as an addict, gaunt, wasted, and twitchy, its pockets as empty as its nights are sleepless. It’s faster than it used to be, so fast. It’s also edgier, and needier, and angrier. It wants and it wants and it wants. But what does it need?”
And I did mention the white, middle-aged male thing, right?
But that’s not this story.
A couple of weeks ago, one of my students, Iracema Navarro, asked if I’d be interested in joining her and a couple of other staff members for a celebratory graduation drink in downtown Fullerton. All three of them live closer to the campus in Carson, so I was surprised that they even knew where Fullerton was; but I sensed a free beer was in the works, so I said sure, and recommended the Matador.
The small get-together was Friday. I was a couple of minutes late, but when I got there, I met Iracema in the front and she said the others were waiting in line outside. And Jeremy Gonzalez and Daniel Tom were also there.
As were 13 other masked members of the staff, most of whom had been on it for multiple semesters, some as many as five. They had driven from Torrance, Los Angeles, Lake Elsinore, Huntington Park (wherever the hell that is) and at one point they went around the two long tables and shared two thoughts, one about something I did that inspired them (much to my chagrin, many of them said they would never have pondered a career in journalism without me; someday they will realize what a bastard I am for that); and something a bit more interesting (apparently I am unique, unconventional in a good way, and have a penchant for colorful language; who knew?)
It was like a surprise birthday party and being at my own funeral at the same time, as I got to hear nothing but good things said about me. Fortunately, we didn’t stick around for the truth serum to begin working its wonders. That’s when funeral reminiscences get interesting…
The least important person that night was behind the cell phone taking this image.
Slight Detour
Bottom left: , nothing too remarkable about that one, except I took the cover photo, resurrecting the old non de plume of OC Weekly in the photo credit, Todd Matthews. Bottom middle: There were a slew of racial-related events going on virtual campus early this semester, including a virtual appearance by Black Panther co-founder Bobby Seale. I had a crazy convoluted idea for a dual photo montage that would show the passage of time over the past 50 years of both the university’s evolution, as well as the civil right movement. Fortunately, editor-in-chief Taylor Helmes had some sense, and green-lit an entirely different idea from Nova again, which was so much better than mine. Bottom right. another brilliant idea on my part, let’s do a series on the history of diversity in comic books! It turned into a nightmare, not because of designer Joseph Witrago’s layout for one of two comic-themed pages, this one about a collectable store that opened last December in Carson whose focus is on Black pop culture, including Black superheroes, but because the final two installments of the series STILL have not published! But they will, by God, they will.
End Detour
:
As things were winding down last Friday, I convinced everyone to take a short walk through the parking lot and across Wilshire Avenue in order to take a picture in front of the Back Alley Bar and Grill, the watering hole where I worked as a bartender off and on for about 10 years, and which was owned by my best friend in the world, Sandy Kates. Sandy pulled that rudest of maneuvers, dying three years ago, but I had to get a picture of this crew in front of his bar, because of all the people near and far who could appreciate how the whole deal made me feel so appreciated, it would have been Sandy Kates.
Sandy Kates, founder of the Back Alley. I think this photo was taken by Damian Lloyd?
Larry Taylor would have dug it as well. He was my journalism mentor at Fullerton College, who also did the discourtesy of dying shortly before Sandy. He was the greatest dude you could possibly ever have known, and one of his best stories involved the time year he rented a guest house in Mexico and invited some of his staff from the FC Hornet down. One of them wound up spiking his drink with LSD. I didn’t have that experience Friday night, but I’m sure he still would have understood what an awesome gesture it was.
Larry Taylor, the Big L. He graduated from the university I spent a year at, San Jose State University. One of his cronies was Jerry Tarkanian, the legendary towel-chomping basketball coach at UNLV. Pretty sure this photo, taken by I know not whom, is still on LSD.
Because it was awesome. And unexpected, moving and the best gift I have ever received. It blew me away. But what blew me away most wasn’t the fact that people had driven so far for this mook, or anything that was said or even the awesome Doyers jersey I received from Jeremy and Robert Rios (I think?); it was that on one of the first Friday nights in 15 months when there was actually something to do on a Friday night, 16 people in their 20s apparently had nothing better to do than drive to Fullerton.
Oh, by the way, that sign to the left in the image of the staff up top, the one that says Cigar Bar? That’s not the Back Alley. But it does lead into a place that once upon a time was called the Tribune Theatre, an insignificant little hovel that for a short time a century ago wielded its blows against the empire, and upon whose unmarked gravestone are writ the following words (if unmarked gravestones had words writ upon them) from a Los Angeles Times review: “Newt Gingrich’s worst nightmare.”
I was one of the intrepid fools who opened that theater; it’s where the first handful of my plays were produced. But my greatest contribution was naming it the Tribune. Years ago, Fullerton had a daily newspaper called the News Tribune. And that space was where it was printed.
See how things came full circle?
Anyway, there were a lot of ridiculously complimentary things said about me that night. But far more valuable than the ego stroke was realizing that all the work and time i had put in the past 3 1/2 years were recognized by those who mattered the most: the students. So while the words were nice to hear, no one had to say anything. The fact they had gathered, on their own volition, as a gesture of appreciation for me was loud and clear. And while no one said that they were lucky to have me as an adviser, if I had heard someone express that I would have said “no, I was lucky, and blessed, to have those young women and men as students.”
FERMENTED BEERS 