Yes, you read correctly. Have you hugged your newspaper today?

As a small weekly editor, working many jobs is a must and wearing many hats comes with its territory. Accepting a job, knowing you will be doing more than just writing articles and attending events for the paper was something I knew coming in, but didn’t know it was going to be this busy.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining, I enjoy and love this job a lot. But this job has taught me to deligate. Sometimes I can’t be everywhere all of the time to cover everything that happens in this county. I learned that early on.

I have spent so much time at work, that sometimes I have tried to use my apartment key with the key to the office and vice versa when trying to lock the officer or my apartment front door. I care and enjoy this job so much, that I can drive by a business that’s about to open, and stopping to talk to the business to see if they want to advertise with us. As a small weekly, I believe in making yourself visible and represent the newspaper where ever I go. Who else is going to advertise the newspaper?

When I was just the editor, the only thing on my mind was what stories I would be writing each week. Then this year, when I became general manager, working the business and financial part of the position and getting the occasional angry reader was something different and took it as a challenge. For the last two weeks, I have been helping out with the retail sales and classifieds part of the business. No, I am not out there selling ads or cold calling businesses for ads. We are short handed right now (we are hiring! If interested, go to the classifieds section of the paper and see the ad. Apply if you qualify!) Filling the position is taking time, so the two employees in the office, (that’s me and Cassie the sales rep) have divided up the workload.

For those of you that don’t know, the newspaper is created in two different sections, per say. You have the editorial part of the newspaper and the retail part, which includes retail ads and classifieds. As editor, I have always done the editorial part of the newspaper, never having to worry because someone else has always been there to do that part.

Well, for the last two weeks I have been working on both parts.

When you see an ad in the paper, we size that ad in inches and columns. Learning that process has been a little difficult, not that it’s hard, just have to make sure I remember the exact column width and inches.

Now that I am working on this, I feel I should contact my professor in college that taught us layout and design and apologize for all those times I thought I was going to be just a writer and I was never going to use this in real life. Boy was I wrong.

So, as my heading asks, “Have you hugged a newspaper today?” These two issues of the Matagorda Advocate have more meaning for me now than ever before. I feel I have come full circle, from editorial to retail and back again. I know come Thursday, I will appreciate the newspaper more. What do you take pride in? Email me aacosta@vicad.com