LAST week I became officially self-employed.
I handed in my company car, laptop and cellphone, and left my cleared-out desk at the office in Guildford feeling strangely elated.
It has been almost 41 years to the month – March 1975 – when I first started in journalism.
I can remember it like yesterday, sitting behind an ancient typewriter in the Natal Mercury newsroom and excitedly hammering out a story about a minor accident where no one was injured as my first ever ‘scoop’.
I think most careers end with a bump rather than a bang, and my corporate one which crashed last week (my boss forgot it is a Leap Year and month-end is actually today, heh) is no exception.
As they took my keys, the final adios, I was reminded that my start as a reporter also involved a car.
A crucial requirement when joining the Mercury was that you had to have a driver’s licence.
I didn’t, but was damned if I was going to tell them that.
However, although I didn’t have a licence, I did have a car – a beat-up Volksie called Herman the Heap.
So I just winged it, driving my own car to news stories.
In those day the bottom-feeders in a newsroom were what were called ‘routine reporters’ who each day had to visit the police station, fire station, Addington Hospital (white), King Edward Hospital (black) and the mortuary, where a cadaverous looking guy always used to say ‘It’s dead quiet’ when asked if anything was happening, even if they had just dragged a body out of Durban Bay.
It was fun and games; every morning I would ostentatiously have a company car requisition signed by the news editor, then instead of going to the basement garage, I would sneak out of the building and run a kilometre to the top end of the Esplanade where Herman was parked.
I would do my routine checks in Herman and return to the office several hours later.
My main concern was the office cars all had CB radios to keep in touch with the news editor, which obviously Herman didn’t.
Consequently, I was always incommunicado. How I never got caught, I do not know.
I eventually got my license, left the Mercury for the Daily News, then did stints in Johannesburg with the Sunday Times and Star, and back to Durban with the Tribune.
Career highlight
However, without doubt the highlight of my career was editing the ZO during the ’90s.
I did that for seven years and a helluva lot happened – not least me getting married and having kids.
But there was also less earth-shattering stuff such as Mandela’s release, the first fully democratic elections, and more breaking news stories in an hour than I have seen in the English newspapers in a month.
We had a young team of raring-to-go reporters who just needed some pointing in the right direction, which I think I vaguely did.
Within a year we had moved circulation from 8 000 a week to 12 000, as well as introducing the Monday edition.
When I came to England I knew nothing would beat that, and watching journalists covering almost every story by phone rather than getting to the heat of the action depressed the hell out of me.
Also, being involved with websites rather than print, it was really strange to find the most read story of the week would be where to get a bargain on Easter eggs.
I leave this job with few regrets. In fact, this is the first time I have departed from any of my multiple jobs stone cold sober.
Every newspaper I have moved on from in the past had resulted in a raucous farewell bash – but last week I just drove home alone with my thoughts.
Anyway, on 1 March my new life starts. Management cannot believe how happy I am. She regularly sees the light on at my desk downstairs at 4am, and initially thought I was sleepless with worry.
She now knows nothing could be further from the truth. Instead my head is literally exploding with ideas.
Who knows, some may even work …
