Sledding Past Deadlines

It wouldn’t be fair to completely blame the melting snow for reordering the priority list. But on that sunny, cold, winter Saturday, it certainly helped to bring a bit of dazzling clarity to what really needed to be done, deadlines or not.

For the past quarter century, respect for the concept of deadlines has been seared into my brain. It began with many years spent in what is affectionately known in the world of journalism as “the newsroom” – a fancy term for a large room, usually in an office building somewhere, holding a collection of desks and cubicles where reporters, photographers and others in the business of newsgathering spend hours under the all-seeing gaze of a group of often cantankerous folks known as “editors.”

For those unfamiliar with newsrooms, allow this seasoned journalist to wax romantic for a moment. Few office environments can match the vibe and verve of a well-populated newsroom: The squawk of the police scanner, periodically carrying over the ringing of phones. Rare moments of relative silence, against the clacking of keyboards, voices murmuring questions, gaggles meeting inside or just outside cubicle clusters, punctuated by occasional outbursts of laughter or disagreement.

The creative friction generated by a blend of creative, verbiage-obsessed personalities keeps everyone on their toes, and can produce truly LOL moments, assuming punny wordplay and witty put downs and comebacks are your thing.

The moments often came fast and furiously, usually to the point where the exchange was unfortunately forgotten, amid a constant barrage of laughter (or groans from others in the office less appreciative of the displayed wit.)

With this in mind, a quick-thinking reporter at one of the newsrooms at which I was stationed years ago had the sense to quietly begin jotting down the exchanges, then dropping the lists into everyone’s inbox at the end of each month, generating a fresh shower of guffaws from throughout the office as the moments were relived.

While most of the intraoffice missives have been lost to the ether, a few notable examples still stand out in memory.

One of my favorites?

Reporter 1: “I love deadlines.”

Reporter 2: “Especially the whooshing sound they make when they blow past.”

Jokes aside, for those in the news and writing industry, deadlines remain (mostly) serious business.

After all, miss deadlines too often, and those attentive editors may just help reporters, whether young or more seasoned, to find new lines of work.

The memory remains a strong motivator. Even when my duties shifted to a home office, tucked in my basement, away from the immediate gaze of any editors, the respect for deadlines remained.

Yet, there I was, on a Saturday morning that, by all accounts, had been reserved for writing and checking boxes off the to-do list, instead standing at the top of a wind-blown, snow-covered hill.

The knowing nods from the other dads sharing the top of the hill with me told me they got it, too.

While the work will still be there waiting tomorrow, the snow may not, disappearing even quicker than the rapidly receding young childhood of the not-so-little one who greeted me that morning with a running hug and “Can we go sledding today, Daddy, please, please, please?” n Jonathan Bilyk writes about the triumphs and travails of being a modern-day dad who legitimately enjoys time with his family, while tolerating a dog that seems to adore him. He also doesn’t really like the moniker “Superdad” because it makes it sound like he wants to wear his undergarments on the outside of his pants. (Also,the cape remains on back order.)

So, on a bright sunny winter morning, the long to-do list got shoveled to the side, replaced with a trip to a local park, to listen to the kid whoop and holler as she slid down to the bottom of that hill on a plastic disc, and then again and again, whooshing right past my deadlines, until frozen noses, toes and fingers allowed the desire for hot cocoa and a warm lunch to prevail.

Because, while the glare of editors on deadline may remain seared in the memory, it can easily be obscured by the gaze from the pleading little eyes of a child, both of us looking out the window, knowing that snow will probably be gone tomorrow.