Filling the Shoes ... Hopefully
Saturday, May 3, 2008
posted by Will Frampton at 11:17 AM |
In his big picture, it was merely the blink of an eye. Six weeks out of 27 years: that's how long my career at News10 overlapped with that of one Dan Adams.
It was just enough for us to gain respect for one another. We worked together two or three days, did a couple of stories and a training session. Then, he said bye-bye to television, hello to retirement (and Mexico).
In at least one way, I'm trying to fill the void he left. Adams ended his tenure at News10 doing some of the most difficult work a reporter can do: shooting and editing stories, in addition to writing and reporting them ... by himself. These days, we call it multimedia journalism.
I, too am doing that. Adams was REALLY good at it. I know I'm still growing as a reporter, and probably always will be, but Adams has given me something to shoot for. As a reporter, I hope I can fill his shoes.
Talk about a big mountain to climb. The man won several Emmys and a Murrow award; both are among the highest honors a journalist can receive. He traveled extensively, enjoying a Forrest Gump-like front row seat to some amazing events in history.
We took a picture at his retirement party last weekend. Looking at it, I can't help but think it represents a symbolic "point A to B." On the right is me, at point A: in the early stages of my career, so much ahead, so many goals I want to achieve. On the left, he's at B: been there, done that, accomplished everything he wanted. Done with news, done with deadlines, ready for an extended holiday.
Dan has left some big, empty shoes. I'm not sure anyone could properly fill them.
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A Television Wedding
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
posted by Will Frampton at 2:58 PM |
I took a vacation last week. Flew to see mom and dad in Atlanta, drove through the Carolinas to visit old friends, and generally just recharged my batteries for nine days.
One of the highlights was my friends' wedding in Lincolnton, North Carolina (that's about 30 miles west of Charlotte). They were co-workers at my former station in Columbia, South Carolina. She was a reporter, he a producer ... and that was how they met. I think one of their first official dates was at a house party I threw in September of 2005. They were a natural pair from the start.
They dated, fell in love, and on Saturday, April 19, they married. But something funny happened to them along the way. Not just to those two, but others in our old newsroom, as well. And last Saturday, we were reminded of it.
Six months before their wedding, they moved. Two months ago, I moved. A couple of months before that, another of our friends from the old TV station moved. All of us left Columbia for jobs in bigger markets where we could earn more money and advance our careers. Suddenly, the wedding invitation list included folks from across the country.
A picture we took together says it all. About a dozen people from the old station made the wedding, and we crowded together during the reception to say "cheese" in front of the flash bulb (the wedding photographer hasn't posted that photo yet, else I would include it in this blog). A year ago at this time, everyone in that picture was living in the same town, working at the same TV station. Now, we are scattered across North America.
Buffalo, NY. Greensboro, NC. Columbia, SC. And, yes ... Sacramento, CA. Our careers that brought us together and forged our friendships also, in turn, took us away. On this day, we were back. It was a "television wedding," a microcosm of what our career is.
Most reporters tell you they start off in nowhere places making terrible money. Then you make it to a better place (for us, it was Columbia, SC), making better but still not great wages. Then, if you can hang in there for 2-3 years and not get burned out, you're on to the next stop where you can, ideally, lay down roots and live some semblance of a real life. Along the way, you make friends. You move. Then you get wedding invitations to come back to that town where you all met in the first place. In short, we are nomads, and it takes something like a wedding to bring us back to our humble beginnings.
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Big Time
Saturday, March 29, 2008
posted by Will Frampton at 12:08 PM |
There are some things impossible to know unless you experience them first-hand. I always knew California was a big state, with huge cities, huge national parks and a huge population. These are things I'd heard about, the same way I'd heard of New York City's Times Square, and the freezing temperatures of the midwest in winter.
If you've been there, you know there's no way can any stories of bright lights and tall buildings can do NYC justice the way an actual visit does. When I took my first TV job in Indiana, the freezing temperatures in January were near-crippling. It's impossible for someone raised in a warm climate to appreciate what cold really is until you live in it.
And now that I'm in California, I realize there's no way I could have appreciated the magnitude of this state until I lived it.
Consider this: you can drive from Atlanta to Washington, D.C. in about eight or nine hours. One is considered the south, the other mid-Atlantic. During that drive up I-85, then I-95, the accents change from dixie twang to neutral, the attitudes from laid-back to urban. All of that ... in a 9 hour drive.
Out here, that same voyage wouldn't even get you from San Diego to Redding, much less the Oregon state line.
For someone who's taken road trips that have gone through six states in ONE DAY, that kind of size is difficult to comprehend. It is in that disparity of the sizes of states -- from the cozy borders of New England to the free-running state lines out here -- that you can almost get a picture of what America is.
At it's inception, it was tight, almost cramped. There were no trains, things had to be closer together. Rivers and bays marked boundaries. Cold weather made travel difficult. And so, New England and the mid-Atlantic grew up as a tightly-knit band of colonies.
Out here, there was more land to be had. Trains made travel easier. Cold weather wouldn't kill you if you tried to make a 30 mile trip in February. Result: three states (CA-OR-WA) take up the same space as that of ELEVEN back on the east coast.
I know you didn't click on my blog for a geography lesson. I know the average American is well-aware of the differences in coasts. I was one of those people ... who thought I knew. Now, I'm admitting I had no clue.
This place ... is big time.
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The New World
Sunday, March 23, 2008
posted by Will Frampton at 8:21 PM |
I've always considered myself a well-travelled person. East coast, midwest. Canada, Mexico. The Caribbean. Northern Europe, France, the UK. Kuwait. Afghanistan.
I've seen a lot in my 28 years, but the last eight weeks represent an adventure I'd never taken before.
The west coast.
As you'll read in my bio here at news10.net, I'm a southern boy: born and raised in Atlanta, GA, attended college in upstate South Carolina, and worked three years in Columbia, SC before taking this gig in February.
I visited San Diego a couple of times as a kid (dad took me to a Braves-Padres game at old Jack Murphy Stadium in 1994), but had never touched anywhere north of that. Now that I'm here, it truly feels like a new world.
My experience so far has been everything I'd hoped. Northern California is beautiful. The station is a happy place, the people are great, and I don't feel like I'm in over my head. Those were all things I worried about before coming here.
How would I handle the larger city? The new people? The fact that I'm working with reporters and anchors who've been in the business since before I was born?
So far, so good. I've still got lots to learn, but I haven't stunk up the joint yet with my work, and people seem to think I'm an OK guy.
The feeling of what I'm doing in life right now is exhilerating. Without any friends or family, any connections to the area, I came here. Me against the world. I left Columbia on the highest of highs, but with perfect timing. I miss mom and dad back in Atlanta. I miss my cats, my house (my family has had it since 1983), my city ... but somehow, none of it hurts. I know I'm in a good place. At this moment, my being away from home is a feeling of "I can totally handle this."
It's a new world, and I'm here to explore.
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