As the song goes, 'It's time for me to fly'

One hot mid-August Wednesday morning in 2000 I received a phone call from then-Cheney Free Press Dave Rey.

Rey didn’t waste any time. After a quick greeting, he asked one simple question “How’d you like to come work for the Cheney Free Press?”

Similarly, I didn’t waste any time with my response: “Yes.”

After several interviews and job search disappointments, I was finally going to put my recently earned journalism degree to work as a staff reporter at a local weekly newspaper. While not specifically what I had sought when giving up a fairly good career in the Seattle-area electrical construction field two years earlier to return to Eastern Washington University for a second sheepskin, it was a good start.

I had expected to stay maybe 3-4 years, get some experience, build my portfolio and move on to something else. I never expected that to last for almost 21 years.

But just as that question posed years ago was the start of something new, so now has something similar arisen: “How’d you like to start something new?”

It’s been a great run for most of these 21 years, but it will be coming to an end as I am leaving the Cheney Free Press and Free Press Publishing.

As I said above, I never expected to stay as long as I have, but I’m glad I did. Working as a staff reporter, then sports editor, then editor and now managing editor has provided life-changing opportunities I never would have dreamed of experiencing.

Prior to 2000 I never heard of violent sexual predators. Yet not 60 days into being a staff reporter I found myself in a Spokane Double Tree Hotel conference room on a Monday night listening to over 300 angry Medical Lake residents grill officials from the state Department of Social and Health Services about their plans to locate a halfway house for such predators in the city.

I ended up writing almost 30 stories over the next two-plus years before the city was finally removed from the department’s site list, making me somewhat of an expert on the subject.

One of the first models I built as a kid was a KC-135 Stratotanker and I always thought it would be cool to fly in one. In 2007, not only was I on board one flying out of Fairchild Air Force Base to gas up a pair of Stealth Fighters heading for Skyfest, but I was getting to practice flying the refueling boom.

When it came to the actual refueling, however, they got me out of the operator’s cot, once again demonstrating there is indeed something called “military intelligence.”

I never contemplated playing a role in creating something. But while covering a December 2003 meeting between Cheney and Medical Lake groups for a story on bringing little league baseball to the area, I got so excited about the prospects (thanks Adam Smith!) that I joined the inaugural board of directors of the West Plains Little League.

I even enjoyed the opportunity to not only be in a press conference with a world leader, but ask a couple questions of former Secretary of State Madeline Albright when she spoke at EWU in 2006.

There are many other examples of what working at the Cheney Free Press has had in store for me. Besides the events, there are also the people who have made my time fun and transformational, both colleagues at the newspaper, those who have been part of stories and others who have just become my friends.

I wish I could name all of these people and events key to my experiences, but that would cover, well, about 21 years of Cheney Free Press issues. So trying not to be more long-winded than usual, I say “thank you” for everything you’ve done, whether you know it or not.

During my time here I have faced many issues and situations, some good, some bad. Through it all, I have tried as much as possible to use a couple guides when it comes to news writing.

First is to remember people read the Cheney Free Press for news about the community they associate with — Cheney, Medical Lake and Airway Heights. We exist because of what takes place here, not somewhere else, and while I know some readers want coverage even more localized, historically, this newspaper has indeed been “Your West Plains Newspaper Since 1896.”

Second, news is news and should be reported if it affects the community, regardless of whether people like it or not. We’re not a utility, but we do provide a service.

Finally, to write so the reader comes away from a story feeling informed and not aware of the beliefs and opinions of the writer. It’s not always easy, but it’s important, and I hope I have succeeded as much as humanly possible.

These elements are how I have approached my time here, and while I know I may not have always succeeded, I hope I have done the best I can and made our communities better for it.

But it’s time to take my career in another direction. Where that leads is uncertain, somewhat like it was 21 years ago when I said yes to being a Cheney Free Press staff reporter, but I hope it will be, challenging, reinvigorating and fun.

So for now, good-bye, and thank you.

John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com.