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Working at home

People are always asking me what it's like to work in my hometown.

I really don't have an answer to that. Being a beat reporter is a pretty universal job. No matter where I worked, I would be so busy meeting deadlines, generating stories and questioning sources, I would have little time to notice where I'm actually working.

That's been my experience in five different newspapers, anyway.

But today, I had a little bonus I wouldn't have gotten working anywhere else.

My aunt called to tell me she was proud of a story I wrote about agricultural economics. She used data from the story in an argument after church.

Even better, she read the story to my grandpa while he had his lunch on Sunday.

My grandpa, John Ames, who's farmed for years in Darien Township, is largely responsible for my interest in agriculture. I spent hours with him in the combine and the pick-up as a kid, just talking about "stuff."

He gave me my first fair calf. When I did well in the show ring, he hugged me, and when I didn't do well, he hugged me again.

It means a lot to me that he can see the product of all that patience in his newspaper.

It means just as much that on the other side of the family, my grandma, Sophie Henschler, keeps a scrap book of my articles.

My job wouldn't change much if I worked in a different city.

But those are little perks I would miss.