By Ruth E. Thaler-Carter, Networking member of NAIWE Board of Experts
My response to an NAIWE post on Facebook led to this suggestion from our director, the wondoerful April Michelle Davis: Since you were in high school when you were first published and then called yourself a writer, write an article about how these two events affected your realization that being a writer could actually be a career for you. That got me thinking in more depth about how I became who I am professionally.
I always enjoyed writing, even though I wasn’t one of those kids who wrote little books from childhood onward. I liked writing essays for school, which everyone else hated (in grad school, I opted to write an end-of-term paper session for an advertising class rather than go to a weekly lab). One of my favorite memories of my dad was when I’d come home with a weekly eighth-grade social studies essay assignment. We had to choose among three or four topics, each with a list of recommended readings. I would show him my choice of topic, and he would say, “I have a book!” A few minutes later, he’d pop out of his study or the living room, both with floor-to-ceiling bookcases, with a stack of books above and beyond the reading list provided by my teacher. I think I got an A on every week’s essay for the whole year.
I first called myself a writer in high school after I got turned down for the school literary magazine and reacted by contacting the local newspaper about writing a column about school activities. They not only said yes; they paid me! At about the same time, also in what became my lifelong tendency to turn lemons into lemonade, I started a literary magazine of my own with several friends. I did more of the editing and production (typing on AB Dick mimeograph sheets with a manual typewriter) than my own writing, letting friends have the majority of the space for their words. I think that was when I started to think that communications and publishing would somehow be my life’s work.
My school also had a newspaper, but for some reason I’ve never identified, I didn’t try for a spot on that publication or to take a journalism class. When I think about it now, I’m guessing that’s because getting the paying gig with the community weekly made both seem unnecessary.
I had forgotten until recently that at that time, I also edited the newsletter for the local Quaker meeting that I had joined. Also typewritten and mimeographed … One of my lifelong friends sent me a copy awhile ago from her stash of memorabilia. It was even in purple ink (although that might have been due to the effects of time)!
One more project reinforced this sense: I spent the summer between 11th and 12th grade outside NYC at a democracy and leadership program called the Encampment for Citizenship, and took on creating a yearbook featuring perspectives from participants. It was another mimeograph adventure and is still one of my favorite projects.
When it was time to start applying for college, I decided to major in journalism, with the goal of being a foreign correspondent based in Paris. I ended up at Indiana University-Bloomington, which was known for its journalism program. To my dismay, though, my first j-school class was … boring! Thanks to my hometown experience, I already knew the basics of the classic who-what-when-where-why-how, and my writing itself won high grades without much effort on my part. I knew that if I was bored in class, I wouldn’t do well, so I turned to my second interest — languages (I took French from fourth grade through high school, and Spanish and German in high school, after picking up a lot of German from my Austrian parents) — and switched to comparative literature as my major, which I loved. I figured good grades would be important, and that I would somehow find writing work, as a reporter or in some other way.
I did keep up my journalism work: I volunteered on the school paper, and ended up in the op-ed (opinions and editorials) department, which was fascinating. I could express my ideas, research current trends and events, interview faculty and other students for their perspectives. I realized that much of the appeal of journalism was the opportunity to meet and learn about people; I’ve always been the poster child for extroverts, and this seemed like an ideal avenue for that personality trait to be appropriate, even essential. It was important to be objective, the observer, but it was also possible to subjective as well.
I also discovered that my sixth-grade training in grammar, usage and language, and my high school AP English and elective “Critical Reading and Writing” classes gave me an invaluable, and unusually strong, foundation for writing, editing and proofreading that has served me well ever since.
I went from IU-Bloomington to, eventually, the University of Missouri-St. Louis (getting there is another whole story), where I continued my comp lit studies and worked on the school newspaper. That’s where I really found my niche in life and a career goal. I reported on a variety of events and activities, was appointed arts editor (which came with a little stipend; always a treat), made a point of covering a variety of what would now be called diversity elements of campus life, and loved every minute. The paper was a weekly, and our Wednesday press nights were a lot of fun. Everyone pitched in on copyediting and proofreading, although my recollection is that I was the only who really enjoyed that part of the process. We usually were there until between midnight and 2 or 3 a.m., pigging out on pizzas together when we wrapped up an issue. It was good training for working on a community newspaper awhile later.
I’ve been working in communications ever since. The clips from those campus newspapers got me my first journalism job, as a staff writer for a Black weekly in St. Louis. Unlike major media, especially union ones, everyone at this family-owned paper was expected to pitch in on editing and proofreading, so I continued to hone those skills as well as my writing. Being a reporter for a community weekly meant becoming part of the community; it was special to be known as “Ruth from the Argus.”
I went from the paper to editor of a university administration newsletter, where I learned a lot about production from our print vendor (and had my first experience with faxing, which was brand-new technology at the time). Among the other unexpected benefits of that job was to inherit my predecessor’s membership in the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC). That’s when I really started learning the value of networking and membership. I was active in the local chapter of a journalism association through the Argus, but the IABC connection led to a local freelance writing and editing project, and eventually to several years of freelance writing assignments with IABC itself.
In the wake of a “You’re fired”/“I quit” situation, I ended up with a magazine job in DC thanks to networking with people I met through the Argus and IABC (and an apartment thanks to belonging to Women in Communications, Inc.; also a story for another time). My title was assistant editor and researcher rather than writer — but I found ways to keep writing, with a few pieces for the magazine and freelance work as well.
An important lesson learned from that fired/quit experience was to always have at least one freelance project in hand. That local project saved my proverbial bacon through a few months of job-hunting until the DC gig came through. With that in mind, I joined a regional writers’ organization in DC and started finding freelance assignments that I often was able to expand from one-time assignments into ongoing relationships — an approach that has become core to my freelance business. That was also when I started doing hands-on layout and production, learning to use PageMaker (now InDesign) and getting an early start on desktop publishing.
All of this is to say that those early experiences in high school — both the writing and publication work, and the concepts I absorbed — created a sense of knowing what I wanted to do as a career and an approach to freelancing of turning lemons into lemonade, expanding and adding skills, networking, interacting with and assisting colleagues, and loving what I do. High school wasn’t always easy or pleasant, but it gave me that foundation, and I’m forever grateful. Oh, and I’ve expressed that gratitude by creating a scholarship at my high school in memory of those sixth-grade and high-school teachers. I should have included that eighth-grade social studies teacher as well.
About the author
Ruth Thaler-Carter (www.writerruth.com) has been a full-time freelance writer, editor, proofreader, desktop publisher and speaker for more than 40 years. She has been published locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally in, and does writing, editing and proofreading for publications, associations, nonprofits, websites, service firms, independent authors and businesses. Often called the Queen of Networking, Ruth is active in about a dozen professional associations, serving as newsletter editor, webmaster, publication author, speaker/presenter, blogger, program host or planner, and chapter leader. In 2006, Ruth launched the Communication Central Be a Better Freelancer conference — now co-hosted with NAIWE — to help aspiring and established freelancers find greater success. Ruth is also owner and editor-in-chief of the An American Editor blog and owner of the Publishing with Flair publishing business. Her honors include member of her high school alumni hall of fame, in part for her publishing work and networking services; writing awards from Missouri Professional Communicators; Writers and Books Big Pencil Award for teaching adults and contributions to the literary community; EFfie awards for writing, editing, and newsletters; an APEX award for feature writing; the Philip M. Stern Award of Washington (DC) Independent Writers for service to freelancers; and IABC/DC Communicator of the Year and Silver Quills for magazine writing and newsletters.
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