Keepsakes & Other Stories

GOOD NEWS IN CULVER BEND

GooDNEws IN CULVER BEND 100 IT BEGAN WITH A BET. I was lunching with Johnson at the Eighth Street Bar and Grill, and we were complaining, as we usually do, about our editors. Johnson is the grand old man of the Evening Standard, and I'm the rising star of the Morning Sun- ._________. which means that the ink on my journalism degree is hardly dry and I've got no place to go but up. On this particular day in mid-December each of us was supposed to be out exploring the city for what my editor calls "the good news of Christmas." Johnson calls it junk. "Neither your boss nor mine has any imagination," he said, wiping beer-foam off his mustache. Johnson is a cynical, shriveled chain-smoker whose careworn expression is accentuated by his gray and drooping Fu Manchu. Our friendship goes back a year or 101 joN HASSLER 102 so, to a time when I was on the North Dakota State football squad and Johnson was doing a story on benchwarmers. I agreed with him about our editors and the dumb jobs they assign us. "I didn't become a reporter to interview Christmas shoppers," I said. "Or to ask mail carriers what they think of Christmas cards." The truth was that I had never interviewed mail carriers or Christmas shoppers, and I was actually sort of looking forward to writing my first Christmas article. But Johnson's the kind of guy, when you're with him, he sweeps you over to his way of thinking. It's because of Johnson, the last of the old-time reporters., that I sometimes wear a suit to work, and whenever we lunch together I can't seem to help loosening my tie the way he does. "I've had this Christmas assignment every year for thirty-five years," said Johnson, lighting a fresh cigarette with the stub of his last. The closest I ever came to news was the year I found a street-corner Santa with a frozen toe." "Not very close," said I. "Draw two more/' said Johnson, and the bartender, a haggard man in a wrinkled red vest served us our third beer. On three beers you move from discontent to philosophy . Johnson said there would never be a truly fresh Christmas story until Christmas was celebrated less often. I said if good Christmas news existed anywhere it was probably in some obscure place outside Fargo. Johnson said Christmas ought to occur only during Leap Year. I said Fargo was overworked. "What are you talking about?" burped Johnson. GOOD NEWS IN CULVER BEND "What I mean is, every Christmas story ever printed has been a city story. I bet if we went out in the country for a change-went to some out-of-the-way village-we'd find a story." I was picturing my hometown of Argusville, on the road to Grand Forks, a place small enough so you could really learn things about people. ~~we need a new perspective," I said. "Listen, Fitzharris, I've spent time in those burgs on hunting trips. Believe me, they're the deadest places on earth." "No, that's where you're wrong. Every place has its little drama. That's a quote from one of my profs at the University.'' "Every place but out-of-the-way villages." "Look at Bethlehem." "Bethlehem, North Dakota?" Staring at the bubbles rising in my beer, I searched my memory for the words of my old professor. "Approach the mundane with a heightened sense of perception," he used to say, "and you will see the news that others miss." Some wise guy in class asked him if that meant reporters should use hallucinogens, and the professor said there were more effective spurs than drugs. He said in his own case travel was a spur. He said that in unfamiliar surroundings he saw more. "We need a change of scene," I said. "Look who's talking. You've been covering Fargo for six months and you want out." "I bet twenty bucks that if we went to a small town-any small town-we'd find our story inside of half an hour." 103 }ON HASSLER 104 Johnson took a twenty from his money clip and laid it on the plate where my hamburger had been. "Let's be specific, Fitzharris-how small a town?u "Under a thousand folks." I took out a twenty of my own. "Are...