Daily Newsie

I saved the final installment of Tales from the Snooze for the final day of NaBloPoMo because I figured that going out with a bang would be better than another of the the short, disjointed posts I’ve been making lately. A fellow reporter always says that Snooze leadership will stab their newsroom staff in the back without a second thought, and this story lends credence to that thought. This is actually the reason I left, although I couldn’t tell it at the time because I still worked there.

It was May 2007, and word was getting around that The Boyfriend had gotten a job in Cincinnati. He was living in Ohio during the week and driving home on the weekends, so I was laying low at the Snooze until we were ready to move. My editor called me into his office one day, wanting to know if the rumor was true, and I admitted that it was. I wasn’t ready to leave yet and I told him so, but he said he had received a resume from someone who looked like a good replacement for me and wanted to interview her before she decided to go elsewhere. Somewhat under duress, I pulled out my calendar and chose a date at the end of May, then turned in my notice letter to him a short time later.

Not two days later, I got a phone call from The Boyfriend saying that he’d been let go. Sick to my stomach, I mustered the courage to approach my boss, who had interviewed my potential replacement the day before, to ask for my job back. He agreed, since the interviewee apparently left much to be desired, and I made sure he knew I meant that I needed my job back indefinitely. He nodded, saying that he would much rather keep a good reporter than take a chance on a new one, and I thanked him.

Life proceeded normally for a while, until a coworker let me know that my job was listed on a journalism networking site. One day in June I got a phone message from someone seeking my position, but by July my editors were telling nervous sources that I was sticking around. Even though I know how things go around there, I figured my editor had made a mistake by keeping my posting up — after all, I had told him I needed to stay there indefinitely. Then, sometime in August or September, my editor called me into his office again. He had someone else who wanted my position, she was really, really good, and she had applied to another newspaper as well and he was afraid she would go there instead, so could I please leave? Mouth agape, I could do nothing but splutter until I turned on my heel and walked out, crying.

A few days later, I stormed back into his office, having spent the weekend sobbing and, eventually, getting angry. I confronted him and told him that I didn’t appreciate him handing my job out from under me, and he folded like a deck of cards. In a most infuriating, ingratiating voice, he informed me that I was making things up, he never told me that I had to leave, et cetera. Aggravated, I left his office, only to return a few days later to hand in my resignation. He had the nerve to give me a hard time about it, but by that point I didn’t care anymore. I was finished. I shook his hand on my way out the door — after he got in one last jab about how unwise it was to give up a career to be a full-time student — and thanked my lucky stars I escaped.

Now, more than a year later, I stand on the brink of great things. In six months I’ll have my graduate degree, and then who knows? One thing’s for sure, myself and all Snooze alumni will always, always, win “bad boss” contests.