Still here after ten years

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Asked if I would write a few lines about how I got started working as a volunteer on Rye News I gulped and silently reviewed the long years I had put in! I was corralled into trying a bit of sub-editing at a Christmas card sale at the community centre in 2014, an unusual venue to be volunteered at. So I have been on Rye News for all of the 10 years we are celebrating.

I was completely hopeless at first, I had retired 4 years previously and in those days a
secretary was a vital part of the management team, so I hadn’t done a lot of IT stuff. I also didn’t understand that a newspaper has strict layout rules and ways of addressing people quite differently from my past life. Anyway, having infuriated some very outspoken contributors and used up hours of the then editor’s time correcting me, not the writer, I got more proficient and I found I actually enjoyed ‘subbing’.

Then the idea of writing an article was suggested. Now, I had an A-level in English but that was a really long time ago and the idea of writing an essay for publication was awful. But I decided to give it a try and lo and behold people read the wretched things! So I soldiered on.

My greatest success was a series of articles about the Landgate. I have children who live in the Caribbean and they visited me one Christmas at a point where the Landgate was in a truly dreadful condition, with endless arguments between Rye Town Council and Rother District Council about who should pay for maintenance.

Start of a campaign to protect the Landgate

Their astonishment at its poor state, when we are a rich country, and their’s is so much
poorer, and yet had managed to raise the money for some work not dissimilar, was a real eye opener, so I suggested to Rye News we ran a series of articles about its condition and tried to make something happen, which is quite another story. The articles and help from two other contributors and the editor, meant that we did indeed stir the roost.

I have continued to sub and write the odd thing ever since. I can’t quite believe it’s ten years! I‘ve learnt a tremendous amount about the ways of Rye and its citizens, despaired of the limited changes I see but reflect that something is far better than nothing, and have made some wonderful friends. I like being in the background, helping keep the publication going, especially through the Covid years when the editor was ill and three of us got Rye News out in spite of it all. I’d love some more people to join the back office team, why not try? I did and ten years later I am still here.

Image Credits: Kt bruce , Rye News Library .

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2 COMMENTS

  1. Gill, I can’t believe that I have been like you ,10 years, with Rye News.
    I can’t believe I have lived in Rye that long . Though having to write lots of reports as a Mental Health Social Worker, writing articles for RN was a learning curve and still subs occasionally have to correct my sentence structure as it is my second language.
    But it is always good to keep one’s brain active and learn new things which I am doing with my new acquisition, a small recording machine.
    I needed help and editor gave his time to show me so I will hopefully interview and write about interesting people.

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