Newsroom Ode #4: Don’t shoot the photographer

Image for Newsroom Ode #4: Don’t shoot the photographer
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the fourth in a series of odes that chronicle the legacy newsroom. Each is written from different first-person perspective. Together they create the mumbled narrative of a special and sadly contracting culture. The author, Don Nelson, has been a newsman for almost 50 years.

To see previous poems:

Ode #1, City Editor, Friday Night 

Ode #2: Reporter, On Deadline

Ode #3: Copy Editor, Standing Guard

 

PHOTOGRAPHER, UNDER THE GUN


My day started


At 7 a.m., taking pictures


Of an apartment fire


Caused by a toppled lava lamp.


(I had to ask some old people


what a lava lamp is).


 


I got the “money shot:”


A fireman carrying a squirming kitten


Out of the building.


(Dead kittens never make it into the paper.)


 


There used to be five of us


But now there’s just me


Running my ass off all day


Because newsandsportsandbusinessandfeatures


All need photos right now!


 


All the reporters are taking cell phone pictures


Because who cares if they’re good?


Anyone can do it.


 


Don’t even get me started about video.


What idiot thought that would work?


A day’s work for 3 minutes of story


For people who aren’t subscribers


And don’t have the attention span


Required to read a newspaper


And don’t look at the online ads.


 


Monetize that, assholes.


 


At 5 p.m., before I cover the high school basketball games,


The city editor says, “We need wild art for tomorrow’s paper.


Something cute. By 6. Whatever you can find.”


“It’s dark,” I point out. “And we already have the kitten.”


“Kitten is online only,” the city editor says. “Hundreds of hits all day.”


 


The city editor knows I will find something “cute”


Involving kids or animals or weather


Or kids with animals enjoying in the weather,


Because I always do.


 


Which now seems like a strategic mistake.