Cool Moms Care

Pick up a newspaper and take it with you.

We talk a lot about our overly-scheduled lives on this site and similar parenting forums. Keeping up with the demands of running a house, raising the kids and teaching them well, and fighting to find and nurture our own identities as mothers, wives, and individuals is taxing to say the least. Stories on topics like these never seem to go out of fashion. Hyper-scheduled stress-filled lives are in vogue for the modern mom.

At the end of the day, when the last of the dishes have been put away and I reset my alarm clock for tomorrow morning wondering how many times I can possibly get away with hitting the snooze button, I can sometimes talk myself into making time to watch Stephen Colbert. The man is hilarious and I make excuses for watching this TV program because it’s “news” in the same way that our toddler will try to tell us that cheez-its are good for her because they are somehow made from cheese (note to self: check that label).

Colbert gives me quick commentary on the “news” I might need to know to have a conversation about current events with someone other than my daughter’s friends because, in all honesty, reading the news isn’t on my agenda. Is it on yours?

Do you pay attention to the “news” anymore? Do you know anyone who sits with a cup of coffee and reads the paper, or is that simply a pastime of the retired?

Think about it: how did you hear about the latest breaking news- Twitter? Facebook? Do you spend more time reading your Facebook newsfeed for information than seeking out information that might change the way you live? How many people know who Robert M. Gates is or what he did recently? When was the last time you even picked up a newspaper?

Newspapers are dying around the country, and I can’t help but think that it’s because my generation doesn’t truly know what news is anymore. You could argue, I suppose, that we just don’t have time to read the news or become better informed, but that rationale holds just about as much water as someone claiming they can’t find time to exercise and then sleeping until noon. Frankly, we make time for what we regard as important.

We rant about the rampant sensationalism of the media and illustrate our claims with examples of the overwhelming coverage of Michael Jackson’s death or the JonBenet Ramsey murder case. “It was all that was on TV!” we wail. However, if you picked up a newspaper, it wouldn’t have been mentioned past an article or two.

Where hosts of Fox or CNN can spend days covering a story ad nauseum, a newspaper will limit the story to one column. And if you want to skip straight to the sports scores? Turn to the sports section and forget about the front page altogether. In a newspaper you can find equal coverage of world news, business, the arts, local schools, and the latest events around town. It’s all there in one place, it can be delivered right to your doorstep, and you don’t need an internet connection or a blackberry to access it- you can take it with you! In comparison to commercialized television media, is the idea of a newspaper sounding too good to be true?

This all makes me nostalgic because my great-grandfather founded The Chattanooga News Free Press in 1933 and with great determination and dedication grew it to eventually be the most popular newspaper in Chattanooga until it merged with the “morning” paper in the late 1990s following my Pappaw’s death. He died when I was 8, but I remember running up the stairs of the paper on East 11th Street as a child to the hum of presses and the unique smell of the second floor becoming stronger and stronger until I reached the newsroom with all the journalists at their desks. I remember the clutter of my great-grandfather’s office with the stacks of papers all over the floor.

I remember the feel of the way the paper used to be and how everyone would call him “Mr. Roy.” He was a businessman of the best character, a man who taught me a great deal about perseverance and the importance of, when it came to working, being “the first one there in the morning and the last one to leave.” Even though the paper is not owned by our family any longer, the same words remain under the name on the front page: “To Give the News Impartially, Without Fear or Favor.” It is a commitment like this that has somehow escaped modern media, and we are suffering a great loss because of it.

I used to buy a New York Times three times a week when I was in college and work the crossword during a lecture class like Introduction to Art History (sorry, Professor Popovich). I loved the feeling of the paper under my arm and I always- without fail- found an article that caught my attention. There is something sacred about reading words in print and not on a computer screen.

Daily subscriptions are at low prices, and I can’t believe you could say it’s not worth it to be informed. Grab it in the morning and take it with you- read it while you’re waiting in line or sitting outside with your kids. Show them the pictures of people you think your little ones might recognize (my daughter loves to look for pictures of the Cbamas). Challenge your older children to find a word that even you don’t know. Look for events to do with your family this weekend, and clip the coupons on Sundays. And remind yourself that Robert M. Gates is our Defense Secretary.

- Mary Cady Bolin