The writing life (2)

In my new life writing and reporting, two things are stressing me out. One is that unlike my colleagues who are near the beginning of their careers, I don’t have time to change course and discover new trails. And the parallel worry: I want to do so many things I won’t get to half of them.

I love books, art and history. I’ve got half a dozen ideas for stories on people with stories to tell, but such stories take time to do. I have a lead on a story based on the Nuremberg trials. To do it justice, I need to do background reading. I picked up three Nuremberg books last weekend. Now I’ve got to fit that reading into a life full of other demands.

I want to start a biweekly column or feature called “At my age.” This is not an original idea. It is a ripoff of Donald M. Murray’s column, originally called “Over 60.” His column chronicled his aging and ran in the Boston Globe for more than 20 years until his death five months ago.

Stealing is a grand journalistic tradition, a form of homage. Though I won’t ever be the writer Murray was, I know he’d like me to try. I also know that since I was born in 1946, just a little over nine months after my father’s return from serving in World War II, I am in the vanguard of the baby boom. Lots of readers will identify with the issues I have in mind.

I want to cover the New Hampshire presidential primary. It is my eighth, so I know something about the process. But I am not a political reporter. For Sunday I reported and wrote a straightforward set-up piece about last night’s Democratic forum. Then I watched the forum and wrote an instant analysis for this morning’s paper. I intend to do the same for the Republican forum tomorrow night. Only because I haven’t done this work before, it is stressful. I knew it would be, having watched so many marvelous reporters do it over the years.

When I was running things, I wrote maybe 15 op-ed and Sunday Viewpoints columns a year. Now I want to write a lot more. Some will be about politics. David Broder is my model here. He writes a political column, usually reported and almost always with a moderate point of view, but for years this did not stop him from also reporting on and analyzing politics for the Washington Post’s news pages. Just as I’m no Don Murray, I’m no David Broder. But as Jesse Jackson scribbled on a paper he autographed years ago for one of my sons: “Aim high!” It’s always good advice.

As you can see, I’m trying to rev up my blog again. The key is to make it part of my job rather than something I have to fit in around other responsibilities. I may do some general entries, but blogging about the writing life will be the heart of it for now.

I could go on, but you get the idea. I’ll be lucky to do half the things I want to. And I do need a routine – not regular hours, which are impossible in daily journalism – but a semblance of a schedule where I’m confident I can get my work done and also make time for the rest of my life.