Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 22, 1993 TAG: 9312220090
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Madelyn Rosenberg
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
That means we stay out of the stories we cover.
But you can't stay uninvolved when the bureau's receptionist tells you that four freezing women are standing in your lobby.
They trooped over to see if there was anything the Roanoke Times & World-News office could do Monday morning when some snafus delayed the Salvation Army's Angel Tree program - a giving tradition that brings toys to children of needy families.
They didn't want to stay long, they said. Just a minute to warm up. They needed to get back in line outside the vacant bank building where they'd been waiting for two hours for a truck to deliver toys they couldn't afford themselves.
Brenda Farmer, the receptionist with a heart as big as Montgomery County, paced around the front desk, her blood pumping with frustration.
She wanted to bring every one of those people into our conference room. She wanted to do something.
In the movies, when people don't know how to help, they boil water.
Brenda started boiling water for coffee.
It wasn't much, she said. But she was involved - she had put a gift for a child under the Angel Tree.
Meanwhile, this event, not 200 yards from our office, began to seem like a good, little Christmas story: parents standing outside in the cold; Salvation Army volunteers delayed in their duties.
My job as an editor is to make assignments. Monday I wasn't sure which one to make first - to send Melissa DeVaughn to Wal-Mart for hot chocolate or to send Joanne Anderson, who had previously written about the Angel Tree, to talk with the parents waiting in line.
Joanne, though, was busy on the telephone with the New River Valley Mall's managers, asking if the three dozen parents could wait in their food court.
She was already involved. I asked her to do the story anyway.
By noon, we were all involved.
I walked up the slight hill to the bank building with a pot of hot chocolate, and Ralph Berrier, normally one of our sports writers who was there taking pictures, hollered at me to put on my coat.
I felt guilty wearing it in front of those people; many of them wore only sweat shirts. But on the second trip up the hill, I wore it, and felt guilty for not giving it to someone who needed it more.
By noon, Ralph, Joanne and I had trooped up the hill a half-dozen times.
By 1 p.m., snow was falling, and Thomas Atkins, who was in charge of the operation, had to find a dry place for the presents or else close up shop.
The mall would have enough space for the presents and the parents, Joanne suggested.
Would the mall take them?
Probably, Joanne said, lowering her voice. She had already called and asked.
There's a difference between covering the news and making it. There are times when that line gets fuzzy, though we strive to always keep it clear.
Monday, it may have blurred a bit. We got involved - we're human, after all. But we stayed fair.
Joanne wrote in her story: "Staff members from the Roanoke Times & World-News delivered pitchers of coffee and hot chocolate to the frustrated and cold parents."
I wasn't sure I wanted to write about our involvement. But if anyone else had made coffee, simple though it was, we would have included it, she argued.
She was right.
By 2 p.m., other stories were piling up and we had to rush to make our deadlines.
"We haven't done a blessed thing all morning," I muttered.
Maybe we had.
by CNB