Our duck hunting season up north starts Sept. 10 and goes to freeze-up.
I have tried for 20 or more days of hunting during past seasons and made it a few times. This fall, I鈥檓 going for more.
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How much more will depend, for the first time, on how much the ducks and the weather cooperate and not how much vacation time I have available. After 38 years as a reporter at the Duluth News Tribune, 41 years reporting counting smaller newspapers, I鈥檓 about to retire.
That word seems so final now, after always seeming so far away. One day I was a cub reporter taking obituaries over the phone and writing weather stories. Now, I鈥檝e been here a lifetime, married a local, raised children, anchored roots in a community, become a Bulldog fan and acquired a gray beard.
But it鈥檚 time. I鈥檓 ready to walk away and try something new. I may not be done working. I know I have more to contribute, maybe with some do-good organization. It鈥檚 just going to be something less stressful, with fewer hours.
And before starting something new I鈥檓 going to take a break 鈥� paint the duck shack, follow behind the dog in pheasant fields and grouse covers more often, try some of that fall crappie fishing and maybe stay out an extra day or two on some trips. Not needing to get home on Sunday night to work Monday morning will do wonders to reduce my anxiety level.
Nobody works 38 years at the same employer anymore, let alone in the same job. While I have covered myriad subjects, I鈥檝e always been a simple scribe. "Journalist" seems too highfalutin. "Writer?" Definitely not. I鈥檓 a newspaper reporter. Now an old reporter. Soon to be an ex-reporter.
I鈥檓 one of the lucky people who was able to live and work in exactly the place they wanted to be doing exactly the job they always wanted to do. I never wanted to be an editor. Never wanted to write books. Never wanted to be famous or recognized in public. (Nailed that one!) I considered 鈥� but never took the leap 鈥� offers from bigger newspapers in bigger cities, as well as businesses and government agencies that came courting.
Has it all been wine and roses? Definitely not. There have been good editors and publishers and bad ones who could make work life miserable. And it's been hell watching this industry and my profession whither, trying to adapt as an electronic medium. (Maybe it鈥檚 my fault? Printed newspaper circulation in the U.S. peaked in the mid-'80s, when I started, and has been going down ever since!)
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Some of my best friends in life I met working at the News Tribune, only to watch them leave Duluth (and often newspapering) for bigger and better things. Always understandable, always difficult, still friends.
For most of my 38 years here, however, I鈥檝e had an absolute blast trying to uncover, decipher and report the news for you. To get it right. To get it first. To tell interesting stories.
For years, it was reporting state government and politics, often working out of a basement hovel under the Capitol dome in St. Paul. I was fortunate to shake hands with presidents and be on a first-name basis with a couple of governors, U.S. senators, a congressman and many state lawmakers 鈥� good folks on both sides of the aisle who would always take my calls and treat me, and our readers, with respect. Not like today.
Then it was on to general news and, eventually, environmental reporting on the Northland鈥檚 vast natural resources: national forests and parks, a troubled wilderness area, Lake Superior鈥檚 ups and downs, invasive, endangered and beleaguered species, forest management, the very real impacts of climate change here at home and a seemingly endless supply of mining stories.
Some of my most memorable stories were the region's largest wildfires of the past century, up close and personal with the crews in yellow Nomex shirts who risked their lives to keep our forests and cabins from burning.
The environmental beat also included reporting on the incredible research being done locally 鈥� biologists, ecologists and other scientists who are trying to unravel the mysteries of our natural world. I鈥檝e always been a science nerd at heart, never smart enough to be one for real but just good enough to play one in the newspaper.
For the past six years it's been my job to focus on outdoor recreation, conservation and the outdoors, the reasons so many Northlanders live here. It鈥檚 been an honor to visit your deer hunting camps, fish in your boats, walk in your grouse woods, hike along as you pick mushrooms or watch for birds, to marvel at your dogs in the field.
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In between the other stuff, I reported on murder trials, hostage scenes and other crime, countless businesses both bankrupt and booming, airplane crashes, floods and blizzards and windstorms, fires and explosions, sewage overflows, news across the Iron Range and up the North Shore, fly-in fishing trips to Canada, a an elk hunt in Utah, pheasants in South Dakota, turkeys in the Black Hills, snowmobiling in Yellowstone National Park, opening morning of fishing on the Island Lake bridge, a trip to war-torn Bosnia to watch the peace-keeping Minnesota National Guard at work, county government shenanigans, and reams written about thriving wolves and troubled moose.
I've been able to do all this, and stay in Duluth, thanks to some good people around me, editors and publishers who appreciated my work, and some great reporters, copy editors and photographers to work with. And also because the News Tribune remains a union shop that pays a living wage. I had the honor of being president of the Lake Superior Newspaper Guild for six years, Local No. 8 in the international.
If I have seemed standoffish, know that it鈥檚 probably because our profession鈥檚 creed requires us not to cozy up to anyone we might have to write about, to avoid joining groups we might have to report on. Now, I don鈥檛 have to worry about that, so we can have that cup of coffee.
There are so many people I wanted to thank in my retirement column. So many it would have gone on for pages. And I still wouldn't have remembered them all. So I have not listed a single name. Instead, I鈥檒l thank the entire Northland community for having me, tolerating me, letting this Twin Cities boy adopt this place as home.
To my wife and family, for putting up with so many late-night meetings, my long road trips away from home and my rants about work: Thank you.
If you ever answered your phone, or responded to an email, to answer one of my annoying questions: Thank you.
If you ever called me with a story idea, or to invite me on a trip: Thank you.
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If you ever wrote an email, called or sent a letter (people used to do that!) to express appreciation for a story: Thank you.
If you called to point out an error: Thank you.
If you Thank you. Keep doing it.
If you truly support conservation, clean air and water and unspoiled public lands 鈥� and vote accordingly: Thank you.
And remember what Douglas MacArthur (not the general, a different guy) once said: Old reporters never die, they just smell that way.
After Sept. 6, you can reach John Myers at duluthmyers@msn.com, assuming he鈥檚 not fishing. Regarding future News Tribune outdoors stories, email outdoors@duluthnews.com.
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