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From Randy Williams, Editor and Grizzled One-Year Web Veteran:

This past Tuesday — May 20, 1997 — marked the first anniversary of my gig as an editor at Tripod. Great Horny Toads, what a wild and weird year it has been! For starters, I survived my first New England winter (the locals claim it was a "mild one" — I'm really hoping that is an example of rustic Yankee humor). Along with my colleagues, I have immersed myself in the challenge of defining (and constantly redefining) excellence in the young medium of online publishing. Perhaps most importantly, I have learned a lot about myself and my dreams.

Hard on the heels of that anniversary comes another momentous occasion: I will turn 35 years old on Monday, May 26. Apparently, everyone in the country is taking a day off from work in recognition of this auspicious event (I've heard some refer to this holiday as "Memorial Day"). In most regards, I don't feel my age — and most folks say I don't show it, going so far as to feign shock and surprise upon discovering that I am not in my late twenties. Bless their pointed little heads.

Perhaps the reason I do not feel my age is that I was a returning adult (also known as non-traditional or "old") student. Going back to school was, in a sense, a new beginning. It was also, in a more palpable sense, an opportunity to get myself in debt up to my nipples. As such, I find myself facing many of the career obstacles and financial dilemmas shared by people ten years my junior. The added zinger in my situation (and the only thing that really makes me feel every bit of my age) is that I seem to be suffering attacks from a hellishly relentless biological clock. No, I don't want to have a baby (good thing, too — I seem to be sans-womb). Rather, I feel urgent pressure to get my career goals and personal plans humming along before it's too late. And like Captain Hook being reminded of his fear of death vis-á-vis the ticking crocodile, I seem to be all too acutely aware that time is marching on. Tick tick tick.

All my life, I've harbored two clearly-defined personal dreams. The first was to become a college professor, specializing in the study of literature and drama. About the same time I returned to school, the bottom fell out of that particular line of work. I would need more than two hands (which, while practical in some respects, would render my clothes rather ill-fitting) to count the number of close acquaintances who have gone on to earn secondary and terminal degrees — only to become the academic equivalent of migrant farm workers, desperately moving from one short-term teaching gig to the next. One night, during my senior year at college, I had an all-too-realistic nightmare in which I saw myself standing by a strip mall in some post-modern wasteland, wearing a large placard advertising my willingness to "explain T.S. Eliot for food." I woke covered in sweat, wild-eyed and gulping jagged breaths as if I had run a marathon in cement-filled boots. So much for graduate school.

Fortunately, I had a back-up dream (and a change of underwear) — to sharpen my established skills as a writer and editor and to move to New York City, publishing capitol of the Western world. Then I discovered an interesting thing about the publishing industry in the Big Apple. Everyone, regardless of past expertise, is expected to work their way up through the ranks from the lowly position of editorial assistant. The thinking seems to be, "If you haven't been an editor here, you have no experience." New York being among the most expensive cities in the world, you might expect that publishers would pay bright, capable assistants a decent wage. Think again. These folks are lucky to make a salary in the low 20s — in a city where a tiny studio apartment in a dicey neighborhood can easily cost upwards of $1200 a month. Math was never my best subject, but even I could see the futility of trying to make my monthly student loan payments and cope with mind-boggling rent on that kind of chicken scratch.

About two months before graduation, I had a phone interview for one such position. When I expressed my surprise at the wage scale, my interviewer suggested that I look for a good editorial position outside New York, lay in some serious résumé padding, and try at a later date to find a lateral move into a print house in the city. That sounded like a reasonable enough plan, since my other options at the time all included reciting the phrase, "Would you like to try our new banana almond whirl milkshake?"

After a smattering interviews around the country, I wound up at Tripod. It was a damn good move. Instead of being a glorified errand boy for the bigwigs (a position in which many assistants find themselves), I am a hard-working hands-on editor. I am given an amazing amount of autonomy and creative leeway in shaping the content for our award-winning online publication. I have been fortunate enough to work closely with some of the best young writers in the country — people like Ken Kurson, Harry Goldstein, Tom Frank, Candi Strecker, Beth Kobliner, Al "Girl Reporter" Hoff, and Ted Rall — and to build, almost from scratch, a Work & Money section that is vast in its depth, sense of fun, quality of writing, and practical usefulness. I devise rich weekly themes for my section, assign dozens of articles each month, and occasionally get to write my own columns. I edit, copyedit, format, schedule, put out small fires daily, and plan and execute major projects that take months to complete. It's damn hard work, but it's also enormously satisfying.

So, one would assume, when the inevitable time comes to think about making my next big career move I will be one hot property, fairly dripping with the kind of experience and expertise that makes publishers drool copiously. I thought so, too, until I found myself — during one of my frequent business trips into New York — sharing a drink with a top editor from a major publishing house (which shall remain nameless). When the conversation turned to the type of work we both do, I cleverly worked in a bit about how I hoped to move into the city and ply my trade within a few years. "Oh," said my new acquaintance. "But you're not a real editor — most publishing houses would require you to start at the bottom and learn the ropes."

Well, that's just silly — and I suspect that attitude will come back to bite traditional publishers in the ass.

In stark contrast to the staid world of the established print media, we who publish on the new frontier are constantly tweaking and refining on the fly. We have to think smart and fast on our feet, be able to make long-range plans without sacrificing the ability to turn on a dime. Further, I strongly believe that much of the best writing (journalistic and editorial) is currently being published online — whether at Tripod, Salon, Feed, Suck, HotWired, or any of a dozen other top-notch Web zines. Yet the Internet is still treated as a novelty, and those of us who stock its treasure chest of information are seen as somehow marginal.

To hell with all that. Truly innovative work from the next generation of important voices is being published online each day by mavericks who are not tied to musty old ways of thinking — and the audience is growing by leaps and bounds. Despite myself, I seem to have found my niche. I may never build my bridge from Williamstown to Manhattan, but my colleagues and I are building a bridge to an exciting and promising future every day of our working lives — while providing a valuable resource for others making transitions in their own lives. So where does this leave me, one year on? Full of pride in my work and commitment to keep riding this rollercoaster as long as I can. Oh yeah — and determined to pop down to the city for a wild kick in the pants every chance I get. Keeps me young. Tick tick tick.

Possible morals to our story:

• The opportunity to meet challenges and do great work is more important than pursuing pipe dreams.
• The author of this piece listens to Frank Sinatra's recording of "New York, New York" entirely too often.
• Life throws some serious curveballs, but it is still possible to bat a home run out of the park.

Let me know if you figure out the most appropriate ending — I've got a bustling online magazine to edit.

Have a great summer, wherever you are —
Randy Williams, Editor (5/23/97)

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Read more "Letters from Tripod" in the archive.

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