editorial.
6 Vol. 1 Issue 9
Oy. That was a stressful month. Somewhere between two Carousel Presents concerts, a road trip to North Cackalacky, and the immense undertaking of the Triple Cities Scareousel Fantasmagorical Freakshow Ball (you were there, right?), we managed to get a paper out. I say ‘we’ with emphasis, because it took a whole lot more help than usual this month. Before I go any further into my monthly ramble, one of those people should be thanked in print. And that’s our dear, dear staff writer Ronnie Vuolo. Some of you may know this, and some of you may not, but that’s my mama! Several months ago, after I called her for the thousandth time to bitch about commas and fonts and deadlines, she made the biggest mistake of her life and said “oh hey, I’d love to write for you.” Sucker. What the poor woman didn’t realize was I was going to make her write a whole lot, and I’d be just as grumpy and curmudgeony as I’ve always been, albeit with a new found egotism that can only come from bossing one’s parent around, and being thanked for it. I was iffy about bringing her aboard, partly because we’re on a record stretch of not fighting, and I didn’t want to jinx it, and partly because she’d be the only staff writer we have that’s not local. She lives a good two hours down the Quickway, and is talking about moving farther south, not north. And yet, such dedication! For her October feature piece, she drove up to the Broome County Library twice to do research, and was so engulfed in her work that she wouldn’t even buy me lunch. Plus, she hasn’t misplaced a comma yet. And then the fateful day came in October when she said “you sound stressed. What can I do to help?” Since I’ve been cut off from the money train for years now, it seemed like the only thing to do was to ask her to help with editing. And edit she did. Half of the articles in this issue were edited by my mommy, and I can say without hesitation that she is the only reason this here issue exists. While I spent a week and a half hanging cobwebs and blacklights for the Halloween Ball, she mastered my bastardized version of formatting, and has put me to shame. If she wasn’t so dead set on the snowbird life, I’d probably just give her the whole business. And so, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I say shamelessly that I am thankful for my mother, and the rest of the family, and the rest of the staff writers who make this paper what it is. It wouldn’t be anything without them, nor would it be anything without you. At the risk of sounding sappy, thank you. Thank you all. For reading. For advertising. For distributing. For caring. There’s a long standing sentiment in this town that we don’t have much to be thankful for. Screw that. We’ve got the Valley of Opportunity, and it’s never looked so damn pretty. -Christopher M.F. Bodnarczuk
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