Directions

I'm thinking about the next step in my journalism career. I'm in a general assignment position now with a large side helping of photography.

My first love is sports, though, and I'm not sure when I'm going to get back to it as long as I stay where I am.

Then again, sports positions anywhere are few, and the good ones that open up have over 100 applicants for every opening.

I'm flexible enough that I can write about many things, but they don't always enthuse me. Even the photo assignment I had today didn't enthuse me. It was just to find random people and take pictures of them -- whatever they were doing.

We're doing more of those kinds of photos because the bosses on high think it'll boost circulation by having local names and faces in the paper. I'm not so sure.

With us being short-staffed, I don't have time to do depth pieces. Someone else is assigned to what I want to do, and the other thing is that most positions I'm looking at involve a level of layout -- the one thing I'm not doing here.

So where do I go? Am I being led in a different direction? I've thought about most of the options. Continuing to pursue sports jobs, specializing in another subject matter (agriculture, religion, education, travel, whatever), photography. I like the idea of storytelling, and I'm trying to read some of the current storytelling geniuses to get an idea if I can do that.

I feel like I've gotten a late start on all this (it's not an excuse, but I feel like I need to make faster progress than I am).