B.C. assistant editor meets Ontario team

For more than four years, I’ve worked at a desk over here on the west coast, connected only by pixels and faith to the folks I call my coworkers. Which might be fine if your fellow employees are loud chewers or toe tappers, but as far as I knew, the rest of the CC team were hilarious, creative bright lights with zero annoying habits. But of course, journalists shouldn’t rely on conjecture. In May, I finally hopped on a plane bound for Toronto to find out for myself.

The rest of the CC team was just as eager to find out how weird the B.C. element of our editorial team was, so Peter Schuurman offered to host a BBQ in his backyard. Everyone was invited! Columnists, editors, staff, writers, readers and even the bravest family members. “You’re kind of the main attraction,” Peter commented as I scarfed down a late-night cinnamon bun the evening before the BBQ. Now the pressure was on.

When dinner-time on May 17 rolled around, I could barely contain my excitement. All of these names and faces that were once mere ink and paper would soon be walking through the Schuurmans’ front door. And there they came. Columnists clutching salads. Board members with brownies. Readers with stories to tell. It all felt so surreal, yet so normal. The 78-year legacy of this paper we all love laid a bedrock of connection between us. We laughed together as Editor Angela Reitsma Bick read a satirical article by Bert Witvoet on the theology of pre-sermon peppermint eating. In our “Guess the decade” game, Board President Jim Dekker amazed us all by correctly identifying the eras of headlines like “The battle for Sunday rages on in British Columbia” and “Is dit God’s vinegar?” My favourite part of the evening was when we went around the room and each shared a few words about how we first found CC. Some, like Alba Bick, were born into it; others, like Syl Gerritsma, built it from the ground up.

Common ground

Angela and I spent the next three days working-side-by-side in her Newcastle home office and bunking together at a writer’s retreat at Crieff Hills. We know that editing a Christian newspaper is a pretty niche career path. So we weren’t surprised when quirky similarities cropped up, like packing the same colour sweater or identical water bottles. But bedtime had us laughing out loud. On our shared bedside table, our matching Nalgene bottles were joined by twinning mouth guards, ear plugs (same colour and style), Burt’s Bees lipchap and novels. Imagine if we’d packed identical reading material? We wouldn’t have slept a wink.

So when friends ask me if I went to Ontario for work or vacation, I have to say both. What do you call it when you travel across the country for a staff BBQ? When you and your boss go from never having met to sharing a room? I’m so grateful for the chance to meet each one of these redemptive journalism gems and I’m pleased to report that I’d share an office with all of them, if only I could!