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Footprint on the World


“Have I made a difference in this world?”  

My friend’s question rolled around my head as I walked along Risser’s Beach, turning backward, to see my footsteps in the sand.

“Of course!” I’d told him. “You cheered me up many a time.”

He wasn’t convinced.  “You never know how you impact other people” I’d said. “A smile, holding the door open – it all makes a difference.”   

I thought about the time an actor with a recurring role on The X-files passed me in the hallway and smiled. It was a brilliant, wide smile, possibly because my white ensemble, like my left cheek, was covered in bicycle grease. I was having the most horrible day, the bike chain incident being the latest in a series of unpleasant events.  That stranger turned everything around. It wasn’t because he was an actor on my favourite show; It was because he smiled. A connection was made; Darkness became light. He’ll never know what a difference he made, but to me it was huge.

Thoughts like waves rolled in and away again. Have I made a difference in the world? My had friend mused, that, without children, he had left nothing of substance. Nothing lasting.

I’d assured him that he had mentored a generation of young journalists. Through his example and many discussions in the newsroom and still more in the pub across the street, they learned the importance of succinctly stated and balanced facts. The value of context. The weight of getting it right. The magnitude of truth.

“You have impacted many so lives,” I’d pointed out. “Hundreds of thousands of people learned of the most shocking events of our time through you: The fall of the twin towers, the death of Princess Diana, Ben Johnson being stripped of his medals in Seoul.”

“Pfft,” he’d said, “… a voice on the radio.”

“Journalists change the world,” I had said. But is that still true today? Journalists are being murdered and maligned.  Facts are under fire. Without context or confidence, who could say my footprints in the sand weren’t, really, just oddly shaped rocks? These things I wondered as another wave curled back into the sea.

My friend and I had been passionate about informing and empowering people as journalists, yet both of us had been “let go” from the very institution that claimed to be the “source for news”.  

Of the generations of young people who had crossed our paths over the decades, only a handful are still working in the industry.  The pride and commitment that we had for our profession is now rarer and far more difficult. 

Anybody can say anything on various channels created by the internet. Balance, context and “getting it right” are quaint notions.  Cable “news” channels obliterate the line between fact and opinion. It’s been a long time since certain cable stations carried any news at all.  Despite the “Breaking News!” crawls and viral videos, cable tv and social media have, literally, broken news.  “Truth” lies bleeding on the ground.

Have I made a difference in the world?  Another wave crashed ashore, swirling around my ankles. I looked behind me and my footprints were gone. 





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