Rocky Mountain News publishes final edition
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By CATHERINE TSAI, AP Business Writer Catherine Tsai, Ap Business Writer – 2 hrs 20 mins ago
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/...
I did not see any diaries on this story this morning, so since I live in Denver, and have been reading (or at least looking as I pass the newsstand) the Rocky for a lot of years, I wanted to share a few thoughts.
I like to hold a newspaper in my hand, as I do a book. The feel, the smell of the pages, the newsprint, and/or that delicious new (or old) book-smell.
Newspapers are dropping like flies. Most of us read them online. I do. But I still like to hold the damn thing, feel it in my hands. That means nothing?
There are traditions wrapped up in these things, these old anchors of get-the-news-out, stop the presses...
I have this memory. When I was about seven, I walked into the house, and my dad was sitting with my oldest brother (about 12), and they were looking at the local paper (Redding [California]Record Searchlight.) Dad was teaching him how to read a newspaper.
I don't feel quite as confident as I had about books not going exclusively online. I have thought that we will still love to hold a book in our hands. That's right, right?
I like shelves and shelves of books of all kinds. Novels from Tom Clancy (Red Storm Rising), to Stephen King (It); Larry McMurtry (Lonesome Dove)...to biographies (Capote, by Gerald Clarke, Einstein {the life and times}, by Ronald W. Clark...Mary Baker Eddy, by Gillian Gill...I am tactile. Aren't we all? I can't hold my monitor in my hands, and turn the pages. It is static, cold. Books and newspapers have life in them. I fear we could really lose something deeper than might be readily understood until the last surviving paper finally tumbles..."But it's okay folks! We have high-tech! Read it all online..." Until the lights go out. I can still light a candle and open a book. Right?
My brother, as far as I can recall, was beginning to dig it, my dad taking such pains to make sure his eldest son could by-God read a paper properly. (Dad was old-school).
I am not anti-technology by any means. I like my cell phone, even though it's for me basically a glorified pocket watch. This old Gateway I'm typing on now has been a good machine...I just hope we don't lose sight of what I believe to be a very important aspect of human need. To touch. To breathe-in a more organic resource, that of paper over plastic. I want to hear pages turn. It somehow makes me feel more connected to the writer.
The Rocky Mountain News is dead. I suppose it could come back in some form or another. But for now, it's dead. The people there will go on, move to other phases of their lives, some go over to the Denver Post.
Come to think of it, could have been the Sacramento Bee they were going over...I almost said it doesn't matter, but it does. Yes. It does matter. We matter. Our traditions, father and son side-by-side on the couch, the papery crinkle of newsprint...Books lining the walls. Hardbacks, paperbacks. Let's not lose these memories.