Sign of the times ...

When aspiring young journalists attended the University of North Texas's Journalism School from 2003 through 2005, professors cynically, yet playfully warned them to all major in something else and follow another career path.

Three years after the exact day I graduated cum laude with a bachelor of arts degree in News Writing: Editorial, the paper I've worked for for the first three years of my burgeoning sports journalism career is put put on the market by the corporate mothership, Cox Enterprises.

Wednesday, August 13, 2005 was the day Cox announced it was selling ...

- Austin American Statesman
- Austin community newspapers
- Waco Tribune Herald
- Longview News-Journal (my shop)
- Lufkin Daily News
- Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel
- Marshall News Messenger
- Three North Carolina community newspapers, and
- Grand Junction (Colo.) Daily Sentinel

Cox Enterprises retains the mothership, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, as well as the Palm Beach Post, Dayton Daily News, and a few surrounding Dayton community papers.

The AJC's hemorrhaging money. It and the PBP have made drastic employee buyouts/cuts. Metro newspapers are failing. The increase in online advertising revenue isn't enough to make up for the precipitous fall in print ad revenue. A real-life "Office Space" is occurring across the United States.

What does this mean for me?

Well, Cox is trying to sell us, along with Marshall, Nac, Lufkin, and Waco, as a package to a potential buyer. Problem is there's no potential buyer yet. Or maybe that's a good thing. The chances of being sold by a good media company, then being bought by another good media company in this day and age is highly unlikely. Of course, the companies in decent shape are theoretically the only ones who could afford to buy newspapers right now.

My only concerns are ...

- No longer being in the chain with Austin, one of my ultimate destination papers
- The possibility of being bought by a company such as Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc.
- Losing the solid benefits package Cox gives its employees
- Having that solid benefits package replaced by something significantly worse, a very possible outcome

To be clear, I'm not worried. After all, The Bible says "Let tomorrow worry about itself." The past month has been a time of immense spiritual growth for me, and I know more than ever that I'm blessed to have anything and everything that I have. I know God's taking care of me no matter, so I'm not at all stressed about this.

To give myself options, though, I have to think about, not stress about, the possibilities. Maybe this, combined with being the runner-up for a job I really wanted two months ago, is a sign from The Good Lord that my future may wind up quite different than I've thought it would for quite some time now? Not that I reject that concept; I want to follow The Lord's will, and the possibility of finding something new even sounds kinda fun.

So I have to ask myself: How long do I want to stay in this field? Do I want to just ride this out and see what happens? Or should I start peppering the Southern United States with my resume, hoping to catch on somewhere else before something really bad - that may or may not happen - happens in Longview? Do I go back to school, get a master's in history or journalism and start aiming to teach in college?

Or do I just go get my teaching certificate and start my high school basketball/football coaching career? A close friend of mine just did this ... am I next?