Q. I'm a journalism graduate but currently work as a personal assistant in a construction company. I ask myself: Why am I here? The answer is because I wanted to help my family out, and working overseas was the answer.
Since graduation, the closest thing I was able to do to practice my craft was to be an associate in a public relations firm. I still try to network with my friends and ask them if there's any freelancing work they can give me to practice my writing, and I also maintain a blog.
My question is: Can I still write for a news organization, or is it too late?
I want to write, but I cannot leave my current job because the income I earn there is supporting me and my family.
Help! I need your advice.
Stuck
A. You are not too late. You are too busy.
Given that you cannot leave your job, the only kind of journalism you'll have time for is some freelancing at night or on weekends. If that is enough to satisfy you journalistically,
great. If not, you'll have to try to freelance to the point where you have enough good work to persuade someone to hire you into a full-time journalism job with pay comparable to what you make now. That sounds unlikely.
If non-journalistic work can satisfy your writing bug, you'll have an easier time of things. You can scratch that kind of itch with many kinds of work, perhaps even with a change in your present work duties.
Coming Thursday: Several of his best clips have errors that were introduced by editors. Can he point out which mistakes were made by other people without seeming like a know-it-all?
It was not that long ago that I also worked...
