Generations: How a young millennial journalist makes (and gets) her news (part 1 of 2)

Marissa Gamache will be starting her senior year of college this autumn, spending part of it studying in Ireland at Maynooth University before graduating from Bethel University in Minnesota. She is completing a double major in journalism and international relations, and this summer, is interning as a reporter on the government team at Transport Topics in Arlington, Va. where I am a business reporter. I wanted to discuss with Marissa how her generation of reporters sees journalism these days, where it's going, and how she fights the allure of getting all her news from Facebook.

Marissa, when you think of previous generations of journalists, what words come to mind?

I think of the 6 p.m. nightly news and my parents.

Are they journalists?

No. I think of old journalism, Watergate, Edward R. Murrow, and Bob Costas.

Thank you. So, how do you feel your generation is changing the way journalism is done?

I think we're on a minute-to-minute basis. I think we are expecting fast, but not as accurate, journalism. We are expecting information to be constantly updated, constantly gone back to. I think we just expect platforms to be different - Facebook, Twitter, even Instagram - getting all of our news through those mediums first, and then going to websites before even going to print, and print is always the last for us, but Facebook is the first.

That's interesting, because as you know from the election that was the big problem, with 'fake news' right? So what do you see, in your own words, as the pitfalls in getting all your news from Facebook?

I think we get led down rabbit trails of thinking what reality is when it really isn't, and I think a lot of kids in my generation have false realities of what's going on in the world. Because they just take the tag lines and think of that as what news is and they don't take the time to read the stories that are being written. They just look at those eye-catching words and think they know what the story's about.

And yet, anybody who meets you is obviously impressed with you - you're so well-spoken and intelligent, it seems you and others like you would say, 'Well I realize my generation is sacrificing accuracy for the sake of speed but I also want accuracy.' So how do you push back a little bit and say, 'We also need to incorporate Old School journalism standards?'

For me, I always go to the source. And I think I just look at news as something to be respected, and it's important for us, when I interact with my friends to enlighten them. (laughs) I don't want to think I'm above them, but in terms of my profession now that I'm going towards journalism, to know the importance of letting people know and helping people be aware of what platforms are reliable, and I try to put down my phone and push myself away from social media and give myself breaks so I spend more time interacting with paper and websites.

Great, Marissa, that leads into the next question so we're on the same wavelength. Where do you see journalism going over the next five to ten years? I've had friends, including myself, who've experienced layoffs, and yet at your age I would not have expected print to fade away. And I told you about the Pulitzer Prize winners, alums of my college, who got laid off. Not to be Debbie Downer, there are a lot of positive changes, but what does your crystal ball show?

If I were to take it out now and just start thinking, I'm optimistic or hoping that we will get to a point where we are so electronically dependent that people will push back and the pendulum will swing, and it will almost be like when people have novelty t-shirts that become popular. At least I'm hoping that's the direction we'll go in, that people will want to bring back family values of the Sunday paper.

Part 2 of my interview with Marissa will run next week. Read some of her reporting here.

Journalists and so-called 'corporate culture'

One of my favorite journalists was Hunter S. Thompson. I remember my ex-boyfriend Benoît telling me that he'd loaned my copy of "Fear and Loathing" to his brother, and that they both said my comments in the margins seemed more like something a guy would have written. I took that as a compliment.

In college, I took a five-unit Hemingway course (three units was the average) and loved reading his old journalistic writings. I liked being a "chick" in a man's game. It reminded me of my high school newspaper, where I was one of the only females on the team of reporters. I am still in touch with these guys, and cherish those memories from Livermore, California.

So looking back, I realize I was molded long ago to be a tomboy type of journalist, one who could spar with fellows on the one hand, while still looking lovely in lace that evening. I wore the same long man's blue and white striped work shirt with jeans in college, every day, cigarette dangling from my mouth as I hung out in the quad and thought Deep Thoughts.

Now I am beyond middle-aged. In some parts of the country I'm even considered a "senior", a term I revile of course, because I'm nowhere near retirement age (and how can I be when my hair is still a beautiful chestnut brown, ahem?) So by now, one would think, I'd know myself well enough to know where I do and don't fit in. And yes, I do know that, and I also know that despite evidence to the contrary, I will always try to fit in where I do not.

I remember being a counselor at a summer camp outside Yosemite. I was 20, and my charges were 12-year-olds with too many curling irons and giggles to fully control. They would, however, end up looking after me as I became terrified of the mice that sultry summer. As more and more care packages arrived, more and more mice would scamper across the boards below the ceiling, sending me scampering right out the door. I remember fleeing to the advisors' air-conditioned van to sleep one night, knowing my co-counselor Karen could control the girls back at the cabin.

I wrote a song called "Mommy I Can't Stand the Mice" and had the drama chug (group, in Yiddish) act out the parts - mice and sleeping campers. It was a huge hit with everyone at the camp that year except one person: the camp director. I will never forget - and we are going back over 30 years - looking over at her, as everyone's cracking up, and she's just glaring at me like I broke some sort of ancient code.

This was my first experience with breeching corporate culture. I had broken the rule of being a camp counselor--never leave your cabin, not for mice, not for spiders, not for some cute male counselors down by the river. Sure, I was barely an adult, but no matter. I was not behaving as the culture was advising me to do.

For journalists looking to take jobs in corporate America (or anywhere) I would advise them to really do some soul searching. I cannot imagine Hunter S. Thompson or Hemingway inside a corporate environment, any more than I could imagine a freelancer friend of mine (we'll call him Tom), who worked out of his apartment in New York, taking a 9-5 job.

Me? I'm still trying to find my place in this world I guess, still wanting to fit in and be brave enough to go back to the cabin. I will always be proud of that mouse song, by the way, and more than that - that I made a dozen 12-year-olds my friends that summer.

PHOTO: The author, a bit dirty and exhausted, Camp Tawonga, 1981

Moving from freelancing to full-time work: pros and cons

Whether you are 25 or 55, as I am, transitioning from pajamas to pin-stripe suits can be a daunting experience. Once day you're eating PB&Js and working from 10 to 4 or 11 to 10 and the next you're expected to be in a cubicle by 9 and play nice with strangers.

Having recently taken a staff reporting position - after 10 years of freelancing - I can attest that there are growing pains. I take responsibility for my independent skin, one that got tougher as I aged, and so learning to be in a team is sometimes tricky. Mom put it this way: "You're like Luzie (her elder cat); you don't like people to get too close."

Now, Luzie and I happen to have a lovely, warm relationship. She'd wait in the doorway of "her" room alongside Mom during the four months I spent at Mom's in South Texas. She'd "meeew!" and I'd "meew!" and know just how to pet her before she bit me. So yeah, perhaps that's me, at least on days when I'm tired.

The benefits to being on a staff are that you'll get a regular paycheck, of course, but you'll also forge relationships that can last a lifetime. I am still friends with people from my last job, close friends with one of them, and occasionally e-mail my ex-boss just to joke that it's Summer Sausage Season again.

What I would recommend before you decide to jump the freelance ship is that you ask yourself these questions. If you don't know the answers, and especially if the answers are more no's than yesses, then get back in your PJs and take the laptop back to bed:

1. Are you comfortable with not only one editor critiquing your work but a team of editors?

2. Do you mind centralized air and not being able to open windows? Many jobs if not most fall into this category.

3. Are you social enough so you feel comfortable saying hi to dozens of people (if it's a big company) each and every day?

4. Can you smile and be chipper even when you're tired or down?

5. How comfortable are you working with members of the opposite sex? Are you prepared for everything from subtle misogny to unwanted flirtations or unwanted attractions? Can you remain professional and see everyone as, to the extend possible, gender neutral?

6. Do you have the physical toughness to work in a loud office where you sometimes can't hear yourself think? Can you conduct interviews either in person by phone with lots of ambient noise?

7. Are you more of a chameleon than an iconoclast, who can blend in easily with most office cultures? I came from the New York area to the DC area and there are differences, especially in how men and women work together.

8. Can you keep your opinions to yourself if need be? Can you share ideas when called upon? Can you accept that many of your ideas will not be accepted by higher-ups?

The pros and cons of full-time employment tip the scale one way for some, another way for others. Obviously, how well you get along with your boss(es) and coworkers will go a long way toward tipping the scale in a positive direction.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons images: BEN_6159, May 23, 2012, European People's Party: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:BEN_6159_(7255866304).jpg