closerlook
W.J. Butcher
W.J. Butcher grew up in Miami and moved with his wife to Moreland in 1988 and to Newnan six years later. Now their home is “in a cow pasture” out in the county, according to Butcher. A retired Atlanta police officer, he has written columns for The Newnan Times-Herald since 2015 under the heading, “The Precinct Press.” NCM: Where do you live in Coweta County? Butcher: I live on 13 acres in the western part of Coweta County, still considered Newnan, and tell my friends, “We’re so far out in the country our zip code should be E, I, E, I, O.” I can relate when Sarah Palin said she could see Russia from her back door. I can see Heard County from my back door. NCM: Have you published a book? Butcher: The tentative title is, “That Reminds Me of the Time.” I have enough material for a volume one and two, but it has yet to be published despite encouragement from friends and strangers. It is mostly humorous stories from a 26-year career with the Atlanta Police Department (APD). It would be a great book to take on vacation or keep by the toilet. NCM: When did you start writing? Butcher: After 11 years on the road as a patrol officer knocking out narratives for police reports, I was assigned as a project manager to the major of Zone 6 Precinct, and then later as a project manager, policy writer and general Radar O’Riley to the deputy chief of support services. That forced me to develop ideas from conception to implementation, all from a blank sheet of paper. The more I wrote, the better I got and the easier it became. NCM: Describe your writing process. Butcher: I sit at a blank page and wait for the idea. When I provide statistical facts, repetitive editing and a humor-
ous twinge, I have a product worth consuming. NCM: What would you say to encourage people who wish to be published in print? Butcher: Persistence for newspaper publication is the way I did it, but most folks hunt-and-peck on those meaningless blogs. Twitter/Facebook ranting is the tinkling cymbals to the masses of surface thinkers. It takes hours to generate a 600-word article worth reading. Wordsmithing is hard to pound out but worth the artistry upon reflection. NCM: What is your favorite thing you’ve written? Butcher: My favorite things are left on the floor of editorial correction. And that editor is my wife. Everything I submit is filtered through her politically correct, big-picture eyes. NCM: What is the most difficult thing about writing a routine newspaper column? Butcher: Burnout and the lack of new ideas. NCM: Tell us something about writing that those who don’t write might find surprising. Butcher: The process of writing about difficult subjects causes me to relive those moments, like when I found a dead officer moments after a gunfight when I had only been at the APD for six months. I become very emotional. If reading an article doesn’t cause the reader to feel emotion (laughter, tears, anger, motivation), the writer has failed. Writing fluff is bad stuff. NCM
may/june 2018 | 73