I thought that was the police officer’s role, someone else’s role, not the journalist’s. I know people may hear it on the radio for the first time. But the walls of the radio booth provide a security net. You sometimes forget how much the news might impact someone. Most times people who are very close to the deceased already know.

Not Sunday.

A woman called the newsroom, asking for an update on a story of a young man who had capsized in a boat. They hadn’t been able to find his body. They were close friends, but she didn’t want to call the family to see if he was dead. Her voice was cracking as she talked.

She said if the young man was dead, her daughter was going to fly to see the family.

I didn’t have an updated report, but here was a woman, waiting for me to give her an answer so she could move forward with her life.

After having my phone call transferred several times and playing the waiting game, I finally connected with the person I needed to talk to.

I found out the young man was dead. How do you tell someone that?

Nothing in journalism school prepares you to deal with death like that. You’re taught to take photos at accidents, speak with victims, be sensitive to those who are affected. You’re not taught how to tell someone directly that their friend has died. How do you do that?

She sounded even more emotional when she picked up the phone than when she had called earlier. I didn’t know what to say, so after a too-cheerful hello and recapping her question, I just told her. “The young man is dead.” Then I told her the story was on the news. I didn’t know what else to say. I didn’t ask questions, soften the blow, comfort her. Nothing. He’s dead.

When I hung up, I continued my duties around the newsroom. I felt so cold, heartless. Was I really human? Do people ever get used to doing something like that? Did I help her, or make her pain worse?

One of my duties is to inform people, and sometimes that means printing stories on death and tragedy that are difficult to write. But sorting out my position in this role was different.

It’s two days later, and I’m still not sure what to think, but to the considerate woman who called the newsroom to avoid hurting her friends with the dreaded question, may you find comfort and be surrounded by many friends to help you through this difficult time.

What happens in the newsroom is people talk about news and create a way for it to get to everyone in the audience. Editors talk, researchers research, someone else looks through the archives, librarians archive stories, copyrights are checked, technicians untangle technical difficulties, and somewhere in a corner (or a big room) the anchor delivers the news stories that reporters from around the world have compiled.

It’s a system that’s been around for awhile and it works. But the news can easily leave a sense of detachment to the person who’s in the newsroom. Stories are thrown around until you’re left wondering what’s really important. Is the story really newsworthy?

After spending the morning at CBC, what I feel in the newsroom at school is exactly what I felt there. What you see on the news is real life, but it’s not happening in the newsroom. It’s happening in Libya, Japan, Haiti, Newfoundland, Vancouver, down the street, all around the world. But what’s happening in the newsroom is assignment editors crowd around long tables to discuss what’s happening and what is first in the line-up. They decide whether TV and radio, or only one medium will cover it.

For part of the morning we watched Peter Armstrong broadcast the World Report live to BC. It gives a totally different perspective when you see the clock count down, the producer point, and Peter Armstrong is on the air. You hear him in the studio, and remember he’s being heard at exactly the same time by thousands in BC. It’s similar to driving home and hearing to your own voice on the radio with something you pre-recorded. It’s a reality check. People really do sit in their cars and listen to you. You can forget that when you’re projecting your voice in a room through the glass to the jock or producer. But the audience is bigger than that, much bigger. How much, you never know on any particular day. For Kevin Armstrong, it’s the whole country. In reality, with the internet, it’s the whole world.

So the news goes right back to where you gathered it from, and if you weren’t the reporter, you never really experienced any of it. But you did, in the newsroom.

On Monday night I attended Heels on Wheels, which was a car care event for women only. It was interesting to note the stark difference between the people there. The skill of the women teaching the seminar, and the lack of any car knowledge of some of those attending. The starkest contrast was between a mother and daughter.

Click here to see their story (and maybe learn something about cars yourself).

Immediately that made me think the stress is overwhelming more college students. They can’t handle it, and it’s taking its toll mentally. But looking into it more, there could be a lot of reasons. One of them seems to be more people are coming to school who are already diagnosed with a mental illness. What are the trends?

It’ll be an interesting day putting this story together!

Doing anything gender specific these days comes at the risk of being called discriminatory. The interesting thing is it is generally only considered discriminatory when the larger population who wears the stereotype of the activity, gathering, or situation determines who can come. If men were holding a men only car care seminar, it would almost certainly raise alarm and concern, especially if it wore the title of a men’s only gathering. But it’s women, and when women promote male-dominated jobs to other women, it’s seen as a good thing. 

Even with getting rid of discrimination and stereotypes, there is a place for gender-specific activities. Some women specifically said they went because it was going to be all women. The question then becomes, is there anything wrong with that? In trying to amalgamate everything, perhaps the western culture has forgotten that the sexes are different. Sometimes temporary segregation can be a good thing. One woman mechanic mentioned that through experimenting in the past, women tended not to come when men were present. The women weren’t as comfortable asking questions either.

That’s not to say there should not be co-ed events or car care seminars. But there is a time and place to appreciate and work with the differences.

But I’ll leave it to the women to say what they felt about the event on QNet TV News later on today.

The trouble is, usually it’s difficult, or impossible, to see what the best could be, and usually it takes a daring move outside of the personal comfort zone. When it comes to jobs, especially with the plethora of choices, it’s particularly difficult to figure out what is the best.

So many people are stuck in dead-end jobs, jobs they hate, and jobs they can’t see there way out of. It’s a sad state, one that can lead to depression and a host of other things. Living for the weekend becomes a way of life.

Some people choose that way. Sometimes because it’s lucrative and pays for what they really want to do when they’re not working. Other people choose it by default, they feel like victims of circumstance. They can’t see their way out, and sometimes don’t have the motivation and ambition it takes to get out. Maybe they’re a square peg in a round hole. Maybe the job is ok, but not what they really want to do.

That is what inspired the interactive event on “Finding Your Dream Job.”

The interactive online event is on Thursday, March 24 at noon with Laura Naumann from the career centre at Loyalist College and Gretta Barnwell from recruitment services at the college. They will be there to answer questions to help people find and land their dream job.

Join in to find the secrets to your Dream Job.

The focus is on a state between boyhood and manhood the author calls “pre-adulthood.” This is the time when many men seemingly try to extend the carefree life of childhood and avoid taking on responsibility. It’s marked by a Peter Pan mentality, whether consciously so or not. 

But the article also raises the question, what has higher education really brought us? Hymowitz draws the parallel of the pre-adulthood stage and the adolescent stage. She says the term adolescence began when high schools started becoming more widely attended in the 1970s. That was when teens started going to school instead of taking on some of the responsibilities of working and caring for the family. That age group became more carefree than previous generations at that age and created a whole new demographic in consumerism.

Now the same thing has happened with the late teens and early 20 age group that is attending colleges and universities. Few responsibilities, a disposable income, even if it comes from student loan debts, and a lack of direction in life. It’s where the forever-student spends time, never sure what he wants to be when he “grows up.” Hymowitz terms it pre-adulthood.

For a long time there has been a focus to draw people into schools, away from the reality of the workplace and growing up, for increasingly longer periods of time. It started with grade school, then went to high school, then college and university. (Somewhere in there it also started going in the other direction to daycares, and now all-day kindergarten.) The message is, the longer you’re in school, the better. The more qualified you’ll be for the workplace, the more ready for what’s really out there.

But it makes one wonder if this prolonged pre-adulthood, as the article puts it, really does prepare people for that, or maybe it’s an easy out for those who lack direction in their lives. Not that school doesn’t have its place or that everyone who attends has this attitude, but the over-emphasis of higher education may be more detrimental than good.

The article brought out a unique point.

“It is an almost universal rule of civilization that girls become women simply by reaching physical maturity, but boys had to pass a test. They needed to demonstrate courage, physical prowess or mastery of the necessary skills. The goal was to prove their competence as protectors and providers,” said Hymowitz.

In this society, you almost need a four-year degree to compete for the high paying jobs. Hymowitz calls them the “more satisfying jobs.” Interestingly, these are the usually the jobs that require the least “courage” and “physical prowess” in the sense of what used to be needed to become a man, protector and provider. If that’s what they’re competing for, but what they really need to be satisfied is to be able to show and use physical strength, it is no coincidence women are wondering where all the good men have gone. They lie, unfulfilled, playing video games and drinking beer while they trudge through endlessly mounting years of school trying to figure out what they want to do and what direction they should go, never entertaining the thought that perhaps life was simpler and more fulfilling when men actually worked, physically.

After seeing more than a century pass by, outliving her husband and two of her children, the only ailment she deals with is arthritis.

Dr. Thomas Perls, a reasearcher at the Boston Medical Center, studies people like her to find out what the secret spring in this fountain of youth. What he has found has a lot to do with stress management.

He said people like Matthews are better at managing stress, always outgoing, and optimistic, even about aging.

“They don’t dwell on things, they don’t internatlise things that are stressful,” he said. Many of these people also have less “old people diseases.” Some “escapers,” as they’re termed, seem to avoid the diseases altogether.

So there is a way to avoid living the last days sick and in a hospital, and it looks like learning how to manage stress is a large part of that success. People like Matthews show stress might be more of a murderer than he gets credit for.

Perls wanted to find out what Matthews personal secret for long life was, so he asked her.

“You’ve got to behave yourself, ” Matthews said.

Don’t smoke and do everything else in moderation. “Except if you play music, do a lot of it,” she said.

Twice every week she goes to a restaurant in Palm Beach Florida to play the piano for two hours.

She loves parties, likes to drink, and likes to dance.

She said she is a good example of why we should always do what we love.

Without all the scientific technology and medical expertise, people like Matthews have figured out some of life’s most expensive secrets, secrets that have cost millions of lives because they remained buried. Oddly, the people who find the secrets, barely realize they have found them — they’re too enthused with the excitement and wonder of life.

In the long run, they deserve it. They are some of the only ones who enjoy life enough to truly rejoice and find fulfillment in a longer life.

ABC News Clip

As Geenevasen said, spanking is supposed to bring positive results. This survey shows the opposite is true; more than half the children spanked frequently showed natural aggression by the time they were five, even as early as three.

The catch is, the study refers to children who are spanked frequently. According the article in The Tronoto Star that originally posted the results, this is more than twice a month. Just under half became aggressive if they were spanked only one or two times a month.

If people need to spank frequently, it is debatable whether they are getting any positive results to justify spanking. Obviously, most results are definitely not positive.

The study itself raises some key questions about spanking. Is it, definitely and without fail, spanking that is the problem? The study doesn’t reveal what methods the parents used to spank their children, or why they spanked or if they were angry, frustrated, or calm when they spanked, whether they spanked in public, or even what consists of spanking. It also didn’t outline what individual parents hoped to achieve by each spanking.

Experts in favour of spanking will usually say to be effective, the parent has to do it in love, not frustration or anger. They also tell the parent to sit down with the child immediately afterward and explain why they were spanked and that the parent loves them.

The study used only parents who spank their children frequently, twice a month or more. That’s at least once every other week. If a child is being spanked frequently, obviously the spankings are not having the desired results.

There are other forms of discipline that may work for the child. But if the above questions on why they are punished, how they are punished and what the parent’s motive and attitude to punish is, then alternative discipline may yield the exact same fruits. Those children may still be violent, even with other forms of correction. On the other hand, they may be less violent than they are with spanking, but the objective parents hoped to reach with correction might still not be reached.

The study accounted for some other factors that might be involved, but there are so many things still not accounted for. An interesting study to follow-up with would address the above issues and then see if the results are any different.

Geenevasen asks if violence in a child’s life will teach them how to vent frustration aggressively when they grow older. Over and over, it has been shown that generally speaking, the abused becomes the abuser. However, if spanking is done as a last resort and in love, not frustration, does it yield the same results?

The study proves that spanking, they way most frequent spankers use it, breeds more aggression. In proving that, it leaves a lot of other questions unanswered.

Katrina Geenevasen’s Blog
The Star

The most recent event is the volcano spewing lava high into the atmosphere and grounding planes going to and from Europe. Along with lava, the volcano has sent millions of dollars into the air while it has stranded thousands of people in Europe and many more hoping to travel to Europe.

The event has grounded businessmen, teachers, travellers, and heads of state. One president was limited to ruling his country from his iPod touch. Canadian and American dignitaries were prevented from attending the tragic Polish funeral. Short of risking seasickness on a boat, or flying into southern Europe then travelling by land, there is simply no way around this incredible feat of nature.

This year, there have also been four earthquakes in four months that have made international headlines. There is no way to stop or re-route the forces of nature. Scientists can study earthquakes and volcanoes, but they can’t stop them from happening or prevent the consequences. The best they can do is maybe predict them and warn residents so they can move out before they are buried. Other than that, people are at the mercy of nature. Earthquakes and volcanoes take everything in their paths, dirt or diamonds, mud huts or mansions, peasants or heads of state.

Humanity has gone to the moon, tamed the wild beasts of nature, probed the most remote, almost impassible, recesses of the jungles, and tackled the frigid north, but even scientists and explorers still can’t totally conquer nature.

Links to articles used for this post:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2010/04/17/harper-poland-flight-cancelled.html

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2010/04/17/volcanic-ash-europe-flights.html