“She’s the O.G.! Original Gangsta!” said a former work colleague of mine, pointing in my direction.
Oh My Gosh!
What does that even mean?
Was that a compliment?
I don’t think he was joking.
Those are big words to live up to.
In new-Urban Dictionary/slang/teen-speak, OG means an original, especially one who is highly respected and regarded. Someone who is exceptional, extraordinary or authentic.
It also means old school.
Well, indeed, that is me.
A classic style, staying with the older ways instead of the newer.
Again, that is me.
High praise, though, and I’ll take it, thank you very much!
We were at a Christmas party, made up of thirty-somethings, forty-somethings, fifty-somethings, all the way up to hubby and I at sixty-something.
We all had one thing in common: we all worked for, or had worked for, the local tv station.
There was the younger set, the up and comers, the newbies.
I, however, was the among the oldest, 20 to 30 years on the current younger set.
They all enjoyed chatting about the latest live news hit, what went wrong, and right, on-air this week.
It was fun to listen to.
It seems so long ago that I was part of that.
Over 13 years to be exact.
Leaving the station for the so-called greener pastures of a full-time career in real estate.
I had enjoyed working in broadcasting for more than two decades.
An on-air anchor and reporter, writer and producer, it was the bees-knees of a career.
One I would never have changed or done differently.
An honour and a privilege to be able to report, write and read about the latest news and happenings.
A career that took me places no other career could have: flying on board a Snowbirds jet; interviewing greats like Wayne Gretzky and Shania Twain; reporting on events both good, bad and ugly.
We all had our own camera-people “back then” to shoot the story with us as we reported.
These days, reporters are often videographers and have to shoot their own video footage, and then edit it too.
And it’s not even video anymore: it’s data – uploaded to a tablet and edited thusly.
No more popping a tape into the editing machine, listing for the whirring of the wheels and cables, scrolling with the dial to the appropriate clips, footage, voiceover and sound bites, until the story was complete and ready to go to air.
Good times.
Definitely the good “old” days.
And these days the newsroom is also about a website, which is constantly updated for those who prefer to stream or scroll through the headlines as opposed to sit down for a civilized hour to watch the news.
Something which I still enjoy doing; again, old school.
I have never lost the news-hound bug, and it was fun listening to how the assignment desk operates these days. Scanners had been abolished long ago and replaced with computer apps that report what police, fire and ambulance are doing.
It was always exciting when big news broke, deciding who will go to the scene, who will do the follow up story, shall we break in with a live news update, all of it.
But my spin around that sun has spun out, and the torch has been passed to folks who are much younger, with much more energy, much more technical savviness, the enthusiasm of youth and the optimism and hope for a bright future.
It’s nice to be remembered, though, as one who did hold the torch for awhile, and to be remembered for it as an O.G.