The swing of things

I spent the first 12 years of a journalistic career spanning, thus far, one score and fifteen years, chronicling for an old paper the peculiar world of sports. Sure, there were moments of pure athletic poetry, like a buzzer-beater trey turning an underdog into an overdog, a goat into a hero, a previous also-ran into a field beater.

I waltzed in 1989, dreaming of becoming the next Hunter Thompson, with laughable attempts at weaving gonzo prose about the human drama unfolding on the field, court, or track. Reality hits you hard and knocks you off your feet; it’s nothing short of a faceplant into a lukewarm bowl of rancid stadium arroz caldo reheated too many times.

My father (God bless his soul) kicked me out of the house the moment I landed that sportswriting job that paid starvation rates weeks before the conclusion of Journ school, with the thesis still ungraded. Did that make me a better man? That’s not for me to say, but it did kick me from the threshold of boyish immaturity onto the precipice that is life.

After days of wandering the streets, I managed to haggle for P700 in rent a month, a roof over my head, a hand-me-down folding bed, and a stove that you pumped air into, fueled by kerosene, to heat that can of sardines, or in the few times that my budget permitted, corned beef.

The backdoor view was of a rice field with grazing carabaos, an abode three hours’ travel time from where the action was most times, the Rizal Memorial Sports Center. Oh, and I had my reporter’s Sony tape recorder and a lone a-ha cassette tape given by my friend Arnel that would prove to be the soundtrack of my life — Scoundrel Days. A more apt album and collection of songs could not be found.

“You say the world’s an eventful place," I'd mutter under my breath, singing a-ha's “The Swing of Things.” “You give me news I don't want to know.” My stomach would churn, with the press deadline tick-tock, tick-tocking, and the game seemingly heading into overtime.

“Have we come to the point of no turning back?” I'd wonder, the same tune echoing in the floodlit press box, but only in my mind, interspersed with images of many old school editors giving newspapering grunts like me choice words that would never see print.

Sure, the first decade of deadline-beating for this Contrarian passed in a blur with a-ha on perpetual repeat. It wasn’t exactly the journalism I had envisioned.

Back then, “constructive criticism” involved a lot more yelling and a lot less “let’s unpack this.” But hear me out when I say I wouldn’t trade those days for the world. Grunts and crumpled stories? They seemed to have amounted to something. I sure do hope so.

So, to the young guns, especially those of DAILY TRIBUNE, embrace the tools of the trade, but remember the grit and true love that come from the trenches, no matter how belatedly. Face it, the best stories are still the ones you have to fight tooth and nail for.