Recovering journalist

I was sitting in a plastic folding chair in what turned out to be a relatively mild 90 degrees or so, but given the puckish nature of St. Louis humidity, it felt more like 105.

The governor was in town, and the whole traveling circus was with him. It was just a simple ribbon-cutting with local pols on hand to get credit, but there was a bigger than standard spotlight on the gov because his name has been floated as a long-shot candidate to replace the president on the Democratic ticket should that become necessary.

I found out about the event through my union contacts, and was dispatched to cover it. This is a day ending in Y when you work at a newspaper, so it was kind of like old times. Never mind that it was so hot that my phone superheated and shut down, causing me to miss some shots, and never mind that it’s been years since I needed to drop everything and chase a public official — this was what I diddoing for so long it’s like falling off a log.

I was doing lousy photography anyway because I could not kneel with the rest of the photogs in front of the TV cameras. We are always deferential to each other and try to stay out of each others’ way, taking turns like they taught us in kindergarten, unlike the unruly gaggles you see on TV and film. I wrote a master’s thesis about that.

Well, I could have knelt on the ground, but if I did, I wasn’t getting back up again. And I was using my phone instead of my real camera because I had no idea that I was getting the gov that day. I expected I would…