Facebook Memories reminded me that my time as editor of the Door County Advocate came to an end nine years ago Oct. 25. It was a sunny Tuesday morning, and rumors of layoffs were in the air, so as I drove across Sturgeon Bay’s iconic steel bridge, I contemplated whether this would be my last trip across the water as an employee of the Evil Empire. And indeed it was.
Over the next nine years, I started a local news website and ran it for four years while also working two-thirds time for another community newspaper. I wrote 11 books and published a half-dozen or so more. I started my “streak” of daily blogging that has continued for more than five years.
I lost the love of my life — marrying her after being engaged for 19 years and reading to her as she passed — said goodbye to Willow The Best Dog There Is™ — and found a church home that renewed my life and introduced me to a new love.
Oct. 25, 2016, is definitely one of those “first day of the rest of your life” moments. As the song says, “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.”
The fact that I needed to be reminded of the anniversary is evidence that a great deal of healing has taken place.
