All good things — and this – must end

The end.

That this is, the last installment of this weekly assemblage of verbs, pronouns, commas, adjectives, misplaced modifiers, dangling infinitives, hyperbole, prepositions and the occasional fact that I've called a column. Go ahead. Take a deep breath. You've suffered long enough.

With this week's issue, my time here at this newspaper is largely finished, some 13,300 days since it began when I, as a humble newbie college graduate, walked in the front door and asked, 'Where's the restroom?' That was an important question. I would do some of my best thinking in there.

Thirty six and a half years is a long time to do anything, especially when my high school guidance counselor once told me, 'It doesn't matter what career path you take, you're gonna get fired more times than a cork gun at a county fair midway win-a-stuffed-animal booth anyway.' Well, sure, I had to buy the business at one point so nobody could say I shouldn't come back Monday morning, but I've also worked for a few employers who gave me paychecks every two weeks, sometimes for reasons I haven't yet exactly established. Guess they just didn't want to see me cry (good thing they weren't here the day I stuck my finger into the paper shredder to see if it was working).

It was. I'm a guy who likes to quantify things, so I've calculated that I probably sat through the equivalent of 300 full days in various governmental meetings over the years, all with a notebook and pen in hand, doodling, making grocery lists, sketching obscene renderings of my prior night's dreams, and occasionally catching something someone said and jotting it down for possible inclusion in a newspaper story. I never did use a tape recorder, cuz' it was too difficult to catch much over the sound of my own snoring.

I also attended some 1,800 high school sports events, by a conservative estimate, pointed a camera at the participants, and every now and then came through with an image that was well enough focused and framed to publish. I also got a lot of great shots of gym floors, the backs of referees' heads (you'd be surprised how a flash ricochets off a bald guy's dome), and the occasional basketball just before it bonked me in the face. Twice that happened. Once when I had a mouthful of popcorn.

This job has been rewarding in many ways, not the least of which has been the opportunity to not only chronicle, but simply observe, the happenings of the local communities through the decades. I've written about accomplished people, historical occurrences, llamas, criminal behavior, environmental issues, agricultural practices, manure management, horses, school tax referendums, city budgets, black bears, a company that makes fake arms and legs, embezzlement, high-speed chases, a black widow spider a local woman found in her grapes, a 5-legged deer (really), maple syrup cooking, cemeteries, race cars and goat milk soap -- to name a few -- and with every article I learned as much as I hoped you readers did. And that's why we do this -- 'we' as in journalists -- because it's our calling to inform, entertain, and record history. Well, that, and we usually get in free to pancake breakfasts. If we beg.

While most of the writing for a newspaper is straightforward and objective, save for the occasional opportunity to be more creative with feature articles, I did over the years have the chance with this column space to wander 'outside the box,' if you will, or, as some readers may have thought, 'off the deep end.' I started to write this _______. ____ _.___.___ ___ __ ._____ .___ __ __ .______ ___________ .__ ._ ____.____ __ __ ___ __ __ ._____ ____ _____ _________ __.____________ ________ _ ___ _. _________ __.____ __ ____ __ _ __________.______ _________________ _____ _ __ . ____ ________ ___ __________.__._______.______ __ ______ _______.______!_____'___________ ___''_#_____________$______ _ ._'____. _ ___ ___ _%_______ ______________'____& ________._ _. __________ _____' _!_ ___'_____!_______!___ ______ _____ _!_ ___ _.''______ .____ __.__ ___'___.___._____.'_________'_____& __ ____ __.______________ _________._____!____ _.___ .______.__.________.(((((____. _ ____________ _____'_.___'__ _____.__ ______'___.___.___ __ __________________ __. _________!_ ______________________'.__ __.______!______________. ________.'' _______ _!_ ________._______.________!.___( _____.____.'______.___ ________'___ $ ____ _______ ___.__%__)_.__._ _________'___ _*_______________.__ ._'______.___ ________'___ ____ _ .____'_________ ___!_____________ _ .__'____' ___+____ ___. ______. ___ ____!______!___,___ _______.__ ___ _.____''______. ____._'._ ________

Your chronic acid reflux problem? Oh, come on now. I only had 1,200 words a week. I'm not a magician. I'm not really a quitter, either, as evidenced by the fact that I stayed at this job for three-plus decades. The time comes, though, when a guy realizes it's time, that the level in the gas tank is nearing 'E,' and there are younger folks out there who can do the work better now. I probably hung on longer here than I should have, as trends in the industry have left me in the proverbial dust, and it now takes me at least three Diet Dews in the morning just to get enough energy to put some pants on (while some things have changed, that is still a requirement to show up at the office).

I would imagine someone someday in the future will be looking through old copies of this publication, and will see my face and read my words, and think to themselves, 'Huh?' That's OK by me, as a legacy is not something to which I aspire. I was proud to work here all along, I did the best I could with the limited skills with which I was born, and I look back with no regrets, other than maybe not becoming a surgeon (you would have let me cut you open, wouldn't you?)

To all then, so long. The end.

THE

BORN

LESAR