December is my anniversary month of My Corner, Your Corner, and for me, I cannot believe I’ve hit a milestone. I didn’t think the column would last a year, but yet, I’m celebrating my 25th year of writing 52 columns a year.
It’s been a very humbling experience, I must say. The readership has been very kind to me over the years and it has always surprised me when someone out of the complete blue would tell me they read the column.
I’ve never written the column, which by the way, is exactly 950 words each week, for anyone in particular; I just write each week about a current issue or just something that I wanted to express or get off my mind.
My formula over the last 25-years is simple; I don’t have a formula, well with the exception of adding the quotes at the end of the column.
My only rule that I pretty much stick to is, I won’t write about religion, and I won’t write about politics. Okay, maybe I’ve broken the latter rule from time-to-time, but it’s never too controversial.
When I was first approached by then editor of the Sunday Dispatch, Ed Ackerman, he had a void to fill when Lori Nocito left the newspaper business and, in doing so, gave up writing her column, Nocito’s Notebook.
Both Lori and my column were able to coattail off of Ed’s column at the time, and when I was asked if I wanted to do the column, I had no idea what I was going to write about, let alone develop a name for it.
I have told this story many times over the years, but I did tell Ed I wasn’t interested in writing the column three times before I said yes. Once I said I’d do it, I was asked to come up with a title of the column.
Let me tell you, it was a very difficult decision I had to make. It was harder then coming up with names for my two daughters.
Should the title have some kind of rhythm to it? Nocito’s Notebook was pretty rhythmic so should I try something on that level? I thought Callaio’s Corner was catchy, but my Imposter’s Syndrome kicked in and thought that was too egotistical to put my own name in my own column.
Eventually My Corner, Your Corner was born. As I tried to explain on a few occasions, including just last week, I wanted the column to belong to all of the readers as well as myself.
If there was something I wanted to talk about from my end, my corner of the world if you will, I would express myself, but on the same token, if there was something coming from the public, or your corner, the column was a place something could be discussed.
Once I explain the title, it makes sense – I think.
Credit to Ed and subsequent editors, I’ve not have had any restrictions or rules to follow. It’s all about trust in me and I’m sure if I was out of line, I would have heard about it. I’m happy to say, in all 25 years that has not happened.
I’ve been so lucky and privileged to express my thoughts and feelings on many subjects in all these years.
I’ve been able to talk about important dates and occurrences, I’ve been able to write about you the public, I’ve been able to honor those living and deceased and believe it or not, writing about someone who passed away is a lot easier than you think.
Noting someone’s passing and bringing their life to light carries a lot of weight and you have to get it right. Even though it’s tricky and even risky to write about someone in the present or past, it has to be right.
With that said, I’ve made my share of errors and over two and a half decades, I’ve made plenty, but I’m human and humans make mistakes.
Again, I’ve never written a column for anyone or for awards or accolades, but it is nice to be recognized for the work I put into my work each week.
Receiving two awards voted by the readers for my column in the last two years has been very unexpected. When you suffer from Imposter’s Syndrome, you don’t believe you deserve any award and that was evident when the Greater Pittston YMCA gave me the Spirit of the Community Award in October.
I tried to talk the “Y” director, Jeremy Popiel, that there had to be someone else more deserving than me. If the truth were told, I asked him if I could think about it and gave him my answer eight days later. I suppose I said yes because of my children.
I’d like to thank the late Russell Johnson, aka the Professor from Gilligan’s Island fame, in convincing me to take the role of columnist when I told him I was offered the job. He told me if he didn’t take the part of the Professor, he wouldn’t have had the success he did.
Russell was underselling himself because he was a noted actor before accepting the part of the Professor, but his point was — if I didn’t take the chance on writing the column, I would never know what doors would have opened to me down the road.
Finally, I love adding quotes at the end of the column, but ironically, they won’t appear this week but will be back next week. The quotes are fun and often thought-provoking—at least for me.
Thank you for allowing me to bring 25-years and 1,300 columns into your home each week.
