Retirement is a bittersweet notion for publisher

A smarter person might have chosen the first day of spring or summer to retire. Sunny skies would welcome my freedom from the rigors and constrictions of full-time work, and I would be like a kid, running and shrieking with joy on the last day of school.

But I don’t feel that way, which may explain why I’ve chosen to stop working Friday, Jan. 23 – smack in the heart of the shortest, and darkest, days of the year. This is a bittersweet moment for me.

Don’t get me wrong, I look forward to filling my days with whatever I choose to do, or not do. I intend to take William Van Hooser’s advice: “Life’s a dance. Take it one step at a time and keep listening for the music.”

But, to be frank – and, why shouldn’t I be in my last column for The Olympian? – I like my job, and the people I work with. It’s been an honor and a highlight of my life’s work to spend the last six years of my newspapering career here in Olympia.

It hasn’t been easy. The Great Recession delivered a gut-punch to the newspaper industry that knocked the wind right out of us. We’ve had to downsize, and telling good people they no longer have jobs exacts an awful emotional toll.

But The Olympian has survived, and. I’m grateful to have served this community as its publisher. Since the announcement of my retirement, many of you have written kind notes to say thanks for some small thing or another, and in every case, I could say the same back to you.

The cities of Olympia, Tumwater and Lacey – the metropolitan area of Thurston County – comprise a special place. It’s the home of state government, and of many smart and big-thinking people who make Washington so progressive and innovative.

It’s a college town, though not everyone acknowledges that fact. It’s home to two four-year universities that couldn’t be more different in their approach, and in the kinds of students they attract. And it’s home to a large, cutting-edge community college that opens the door to higher education and job training for anyone who knocks.

It’s no longer a small town, but neither is it a bustling metropolis. We’re in between, perhaps transitioning from one to the other, but still of a size where relationships are paramount. For example, the way elected officials treat colleagues and constituents sometimes matters more to voters than their political philosophy.

It’s a town that its residents are passionate about. That creates tension, lots of public conversation and sometimes a process to get something done that seems to go on forever. But I’d rather live and work in such a community than one where nobody cares.

It’s a town that seems headed in the right direction. (Although, I should add here that it still makes no sense to me that a community of this size has three separate municipal governments. One tri-city government with council members elected by districts would be so much more efficient.)

People have asked why I’m leaving now. The simple answer is that at age 67, it’s just time. I started in the newspaper business working after school and on Saturdays in my father’s weekly Minnesota newspaper. We wrote on manual typewriters then, and I sorted individual letters of metal and wooden type in typecases.

We lived above the newspaper office. I fell asleep every Tuesday night listening to the rumble of the four-page, flat-bed Miehle letterpress beneath me, knowing my dad was down there printing that week’s issue one large sheet of paper at a time.

My dad came home at night with ink-stained hands, not with the wild-eyed stare of someone who spent all day in front of a computer screen.

Long ago, I vowed never to write a “last column.” They are too often maudlin and boring. It’s better, I thought, to just say it’s been fun and see you around. So I broke that vow today because to tell the truth, I just couldn’t pass up the chance to at least try to say how much this job, this town, and this experience have meant to me.

I hope to have made some small positive contribution to the Olympia area. And certainly the Olympia area has made a big contribution to the satisfaction I feel about my life and work.

Anyway, thanks, it’s been fun. See you around.

This story was originally published January 18, 2015 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Retirement is a bittersweet notion for publisher."