Can a 'Country Mouse" ever really move back to the City...and get a "real job"? [View all]

[FirstLight]

Been an eye opening day for me and I am not sure how to deal with it...so here I am, speaking to my anonymous group pf friends that I have cultivated for the past few years...

See, all this time I have identified myself as a Journalist - with big ideas and thoughts about ethics, integrity and the recent shield laws vs. whistle-blowers. That much is true, I am really invested personally in journalistic integrity and the whole idea of breaking big stories and speaking truth to power.
But the reality is that I have been living in a small town for the past 20 years and I grew up here as a college student and the largest publication I ever worked for maybe had 15-20K circulation at its peak...
Sure, I covered City Council issues and labor disputes, current events, etc...but I covered features a lot more.
I've been blogging and posting so much over the past few years maybe I have become too conversational in my tone. I recall my Mg Ed when I was in my late 20s giving me a lecture for hugging a distraught wife of a drowning victim as she relayed info to me about the obituary... "that was unprofessional" he said. I told him if "professional" meant giving up being HUMAN -I'd gladly be UN professional. My tone in writing has always been more conversational than literary, so there's that.

So I am finally finishing my BA in JRN/COM and feeling really good because I have experience the younger people in my classes do not. I am excelling in my grades, discussions, etc. I have done the salary research and figured I was limiting myself to thinking I would only be worth a 30K/year job with the local rag, and raised my hopes to a senior reporter position, and maybe even moving off this mountain and re-entering the mainstream...

I send my resume and cover letter to a colleague who is my senior by about 20 years. He was the old grizzled reporter who sat next to me in the newsroom as a rookie, and has remained a friend and mentor over the years... He tells me my letter is "too girly" and unprofessional. Thank god he cleaned it up, but no I am doubting ALL my writing, wondering if I can even think of competing in the big nasty wold out there. Maybe it is a good thing to stay in the little fishpond, even if the pay sucks