The State v. 5 W's

I note this week the 35th anniversary of not more than 35 minutes of Journalism class. Hopped up on Jack Kerouac, Hunter Thompson, Tom Wolfe, linked by the Voice, the Stone, and a single dog-earred Berkeley Barb, to a whole world seemingly in revolution, the road undertaken as always where I'm concerned, marches at a distance, conveyed by words. When the first class covering the 5 W's was over, and a query to the professor about Thompson elicted no recognition, the honor of all New Journalism at stake, I exited stage left, no better reporter than I was coming in.

There never was a thank you card from Jack, Hunter or Tom, or the Revoluton, for sacrifices made on their behalf, and so a bureaucrat was born. No matter. Yet, though the way was once lost, perhaps its taken three necessary decades, to find it again.

For a real pro like A.J. Leibling, "it is impossible for me to estimate how many of my early impressions of the world, correct and the opposite, came to me through newspapers. Homicide, adultery, no-hit pitching, and Balkanism were concepts that, left to my own devices, I would have encountered much later in life. Through newspapers I acquired a vicarous knowledge, or perhaps more accurately an illusion of knowledge, of just about everything in the world from polar exploration to the mores of choir singers and the names of the ten greatest novels ever written."

By the time you attend college, Leibling advises, "the way to learn about journalism is in a class on sociology." Agreed - even an expert on the 5 W's, in the absence of -ology knowledge, wouldn't be able to adequately explain a recent AP article where a rather harmless and benign proposal to create a promotional Alabama wine trail hits a sour note with alert Baptists who respond they'd "support visiting old, historic churches, but as far as visiting wineries, we're on record as being opposed to any kind of alchohol related industry."

What's in, and not in, a recent obit in the local rag leaves much to psychologically analyze: "he greatly admired Winston Churchill and often quoted his speeches from memory in an accent and manner reminiscent of the man himself. He was convinced until the very end that Frank Sinatra was a draft dodger." He was never married.

A letter writer last week in the Farquier Times-Democrat took the paper to task for not widely covering the death of a man she says possessed a "depth of knowledge and understanding matched only by the bright fervor in his eyes and eagerness of manner as he spoke of the expanses of cherished farmland and the picturequeness of the villages and hamlets he wanted to leave forever." I would have liked to know him.

Another small country paper fifty miles West keeps obits shorter and sweeter describing a pair of recently deceased simply as 'groom,' and 'farmer,' words carrying a far greater meaning beyond their terseness in today's non-stop world.

Moving this past week from a rocking chair on the front porch of our annual parish retreat at Shrinemont in the Shenandoah mountains, to Oakland, on what is dearly hoped is the last in a series of wearying pre-retirement business trips, I note some local happenings there which might just have taken place in any small Virginia town: a film at the library on neighborhood garden plots; a Friends Church Quaker Heritage Day; native plant garden tour; Cerrito Creek restoration, a liturgical prayer celebration.

When asked in the Shenandoah Page News and Courier, "What will the Town of Shenandoah look like 10 years from now," a candidate replies, "small shops on First Street (tea rooms, coffee shops, sandwich shops, crafts, recreational programs utilizing River Park, blighted areas cleaned up," responses interchangeable in Virginia or California.

Now, to be fair, there are differences - the Town of Shenandoah will not likely declare itself a nuclear-free zone nor mandate fair-trade shade-grown coffee in those Main Street coffee houses, nor hold a 39th anniversary celebration of the seminal People's Park demonstration which jump-started the '60's protest movement, yet underneath it all, the same idea of preserving small town community, is just as relevant on the West Coast as it is in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

The notion's not as far-fetched as you might think. On the drive home from the parish retreat, on a lonely mountain pass, we stopped at a road-side store. As I bought a porcelain Jerry Garcia, California and Virginia met, in an American small town state of mind.