Happy Thanksgiving, dear readers:
Keeping a nonprofit newsroom going is hard work. We don’t throw pity parties around that fact because that’d be a colossal waste of time and we don’t have time. But every once in a while, when the juggling gets too fast and we drop a ball, we think, I must admit, that the cost of running a nonprofit newsroom is a little too high and maybe we should find jobs with health insurance and retirement plans and hours that don’t begin with the sunrise and end after supper.
But in those moments, human moments, one thing pulls us back and grounds us.
You.
You, our readers. Our sources. Our news partners. Our Facebook and Twitter followers. Our newsletter subscribers and sharers. You, our donors — because you go an extra step to make sure we can pay for the reporting costs, for the insurance, for the rent, for the software and notebooks and thank you notes and the occasional cake to say farewell to another young ‘un whom we have mentored and who is leaving our nest for bigger things.
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In all your emails, in your tips, in your contributions and comments, you remind us that out there in this beautiful, complicated state people want to know what government is doing in their names. People are hungry to see themselves and the communities to which they belong reflected in honest and accurate coverage. When you partner with us on a news story or share your best stories with our readers, you remind us of how collaboration can make journalism in this state stronger.
And when you answer our questions and share your experiences, you remind us of the privilege of this work. “I have waited 18 years to tell someone my story,” a woman told me recently and there is not a more humbling thing than to realize that someone has handed you part of her heart in the hope you might find the words to make others feel it beating.
You remind us of our responsibility and what it means to be part of a free press in a democracy. We could not do this work without our sources any more than we could without our readers and donors. We make it work together. That’s what it means to be part of the Indy family. That’s what it means to play a role in building and sustaining a trusted newsroom.
On this Thanksgiving Day, but, really, on any day when we risk losing sight of the big picture, we are grateful to you. We are grateful for you. No pity parties here. Just gratitude.
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