Even in the Storm

Available for hire: one experienced storm chaser and live shot reporter.

I woke up thinking about a 15-month old baby missing after the Midwest tornadoes. News reports say the father had used his own body to shield his son and wife but the tornado ripped the child away. Reports said the hospitalized parents were too injured to know their baby is gone.

So here I am again, ready to head back if I get an assignment. Why? Why give up comfort and security for a story? Why face danger for potentially no reward?

I grew up in tornado alley and went to work at a rural TV station after grad school. Racing down dirt roads, chasing funnel clouds, tracking a path of twisted trees and flattened corn stalks...just another day's work.

"Please don't go," said my friend Esther when I told her about my plan. 

"It's not the risk or the adrenaline," I struggled to explain. "I know the child's probably dead but there's something about that family's story..."

After reflecting a minute, Esther began to speak. "It's because the father covering his child with his body - it points to God," she said. "Even in tragedy, the father was there. The tragedy doesn't discredit the father's love. That is the true character of God."

A father's love - that is the story worth telling.  A love that cannot be quenched...even in the storm.

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The End of the World, Again?

May marks my 11-year anniversary in California. 

The world didn't end as predicted in 2000 (remember Y2K?) so that spring I'd packed the few things that fit into my two-seater, headed south on I-5 and showed up on a friend's doorstep in the Bay Area.

Fast forward seven years. 

Spring again. Packed again. Back on the I-5. This time bound for LA. 

"God has released you to pursue the adventure of His calling," said my pastor and friend.

Even though I didn't clearly see the reasons for change, it felt like time. I was happy when the move fell into place so quickly; my roommate and I took the first place we found on the Internet that would rent to us sight unseen.  Seemed to confirm it was time to go.

"I feel like LA holds part of God's redemptive plan for me," I'd told friends. Yet I have a lingering sense of delayed destiny. 

Blinded my ambition when I was a young reporter, I'd wasted the platforms I could have used to help others. 

Regrets? Certainly. 

Redemption? Absolutely.

Spring again. A fresh start. 

But why do my moves always seem to coincide with the end of the world? In 2000, it was Y2K.  This time it's supposedly Judgment Day.  Starting right here in the Pacific Rim on May 21st (read the prophecy here). 

Guess I'll be happy either way with a front row seat to either the sunset...or the Rapture.

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He said. She said. the iPad said.

They say dog lovers choose pets that look like them. And that after a while, even couples start to resemble eachother. 

If only communication worked the same way.  Instead it seems many couples barely speak over time.

The breakdown starts when we're singles seeking love. 

He texts. We should hang out. 

Does he mean I think you're hot or The guys are busy hang out?  

We make it just as confusing for guys. 

You ask us for a date and we say: "Find me on Facebook." Which means, You're not my type, or Leave me alone, stalker.

The Millennial generation - they consider texting and sexting a quality relationship - often gets blamed for the death of dating but maybe they're not the culprit.

I wrote on Facebook: "Saw the sweetest proposal! Guy takes his girlfriend to look at iPads. When she turns it on the message on the screen asks, 'Will you marry me?'"

He needed to man up and not do it via technology.

He needs to stop hiding behind technology.

I am not a fan of men trying to get at women via technology.

Quelle backlash, ma cherie!  And from my 20-something friends!

I saw how much effort the guy put in to surprising his girlfriend so I defended the digital proposal. "I don't like guys using FB or texting to ask for a date, calling's better, but he'd obviously spent time to make the proposal memorable."

My 20-something friends won't budge. They say people hide behind technology. So maybe dating's demise can't be blamed on Millennials but instead on the enduring fear of rejection...or that we'll wind up looking like a pug.

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You Are Beautiful

Photo: Maria Peterson Photography

An elderly woman approached me in the store. "You have a cute nose," she said. "Is it yours?"

"She asked because you live in Hollywood," a friend said. Maybe. Or have we become so used to images of injected, tucked, implanted women that the real thing surprises us?

Friends said my feelings about cosmetic surgery would change as I got older. They haven't. I still think women often look less attractive after their procedures.

One friend's lips are so plump she reminds me of the Joker. I'm not being mean; I just thought her mouth was the right size and shape for her thin face before the fillers.

I used to dread representing my station at public events; viewers often slammed my natural hair, full lips, curvy (size six) hips. 

So my TV bosses would hire a stylist, hair and makeup artists to mold me into the perfect talking head. 

"I don't care if you make me a blonde," I told them, "It's your money."

I've learned to accept the ugly side of show business but I still don't want to try to look like Beyoncé. Of course, she's gorgeous but no amount of nipping, Botoxing or augmenting will make me Beyoncé.

Thankfully the mirror doesn't have to remain our enemy. Accepting our natural beauty is worth far more than any perpetually perky boobs or flawlessly sculpted abs will ever be.

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Going Back

Sometimes a writer starts a story with no idea how it'll end. Like a painter, you start mixing colors - words, images - with no idea what they'll look like on the canvas.

Such is the case with this blog. I started blogging after meeting a TV producer who wants to do a show about journalists. I thought this blog would be a good way to archive some of the stories I've covered in case she might want to use them in a TV series.

Then an earthquake hit 3,000 miles from Hollywood. No red carpets. No stylists. No paparazzi.  A make-believe TV show would have to wait. 

Instead of a newsroom, the base of a mango tree became my office. Armed security for escorts. Broken, dry ground for a bed. 

I was afraid to go but I had to. I get why CBS reporter Lara Logan vows to return to reporting despite being gang-raped in Egypt; sometimes nothing can keep you from doing what you're meant to do...

I was a grad student the first time we were attacked on a story. A deranged man tried to smash our gear to the ground. We weren't hurt but we learned the camera is a magnet for nuts - and to keep an eye out for a rock if you need to defend yourself.

I thought about getting a gun permit as my assignments got more dangerous (growing up on Army bases, we were taught how early how to use weapons), especially while covering the murder of a young mother.

Two masked gunmen had burst into the offices of a gang prevention program yelling, "Give us your purses! Give us the money!"  

They shot mom of three, Christina Clegg, as she sat at her desk.

The crime was made to look like a botched payday robbery but who pumps five rounds into a mom at work?

"Get off the story," neighbors warned me, "They'll kill you, too."

I eventually got enough facts to air exclusives about a suspect police refused to name. He threatened to kill me after we ambushed him, cameras rolling, at his lawyer's office. 

I looked over my shoulder for months until police had enough evidence to arrest him.

Bastard husband. 

Grover Clegg is serving life in prison for hiring his own brother to kill his wife.  For insurance money.

And so I go back. to disaster areas. and war zones. and inner cities. Because sometimes all it takes to see justice prevail is a mic and a camera. 

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The Storyteller's Calling

I was walking along the beach when I ran into a man in an orange prison jumpsuit. I was a little afraid since the shoreline was deserted except for us and a few seagulls.

Should I keep walking? Run like mad? Call 911?

You'd think living near Hollywood I'd know by now things often aren't what they seem. Turns out the "escaped convict" was an actor waiting for a camera crew.

Watching the actor, photographer and ocean move with each other was like turning the pages of a book. Storytellers - crafting lines with images instead of words.

In my mind the beach melted away and I was back in Haiti where I'd write sitting under the mango tree. This is where I finally got it: for some of us storytelling is a calling, not merely a job.

"The times when I got to uncover someone's story," said Kezia, "when I got to ask questions and discover something I would not have known had I not hunted for it, those are the things that moved me."

Watching the story being written on the shore stirred something in me. The calling. Yes, it's still there.

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Jump Cut

Photo: Maria Peterson Photography

"Mommy says my legs are fat," the little girl said quietly.

I'm all for fighting childhood obesity but she didn't even look chubby. Labeled "fat" by first grade, I wondered what demons lurked in her future: self-hatred? depression? perfectionism?

I was such a perfectionist that a professor worried I'd crack under the intense pressure of a TV career. 

"You're too hard on yourself," she cautioned as I tried to fix a jump cut (an unintentional edit in news that makes it look like there's a jump between two shots) in my story.

While a jump cut isn't fatal, there's no room for imperfection when performance is measured frame-by-frame. The bad edit was like a neon sign: FAILURE. FAILURE. FAILURE.

To prepare us for TV's relentless demands, certain mistakes meant automatic failure. 

Misspelled name? "F." 

Mispronounced city? "F." 

Late to class? Don't bother coming. "Doesn't matter who you are," our professor warned, "the news airs without you."

It took years for me to see the difference between perfectionism and excellence. I finally got it when I heard a speaker say, "If your perfect life is coming between you and love, you're paying too high a price."

What he meant is: If your husband is afraid to kiss you for fear of smudging your perfect makeup and your kids walk on eggshells for fear of ruining your perfect house, then your perfect life costs too much.

For the times when life is messy or our thighs are fat or there's a jump cut in our story, perfectionism is unforgiving; excellence gives grace.

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