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Readers Comments:
Back by popular demand:
The Geneseo column

The Clarion is 10 years old? Happy birthday and congratulations on a job well done. Wait a second. If the Clarion is 10 years old that means I am also 10 years older. I'm not sure I want to admit that.

Last week, "Clarion Strongman" Corrin approached me about writing one last column about my tenure as Geneseo columnist from 1990 to 1997. A flood of memories, mostly good, overwhelmed me. Since I am not one who likes to make promises that cannot be kept, I was non-committal and said "just maybe I can do that and maybe not." Maybe I can and here it is.

Corrin, who has a habit of approaching people, cornered me in the Geneseo Post Office in January 1990. He said that he liked my letter to the editor that had recently appeared in a competing newspaper. I said that if he ever needed some writing done to give me a call. He did and I did for six and half years.

I estimate that I wrote close to 340 Geneseo columns, only missing one during the 1991 Ice Storm. Perhaps, I wrote more then 200,000 words during my tenure.

Speaking of weather, during the early days of the Clarion, Corrin would hand-deliver sample papers in Geneseo with the ultimate goal of gaining new subscribers. He drafted me to help one winter day. It was cold (-10 degrees) and windy. I was miserable but the job got done much to Corrin's satisfaction.

Writing for the Clarion was fun. I got to work with great people like Georgia Mullin, Howard Appell, and yes, Terry Proctor. There were so many other great people that worked or continue to work for the Clarion, but there is not enough space.

Fun was trying to torment Corrin Strong by seeing what I could get by with and what I could not in my weekly column. Of course, while he will never admit it, Corrin could be down right outrageous. One summer, a family-oriented organization was picketing a local video store that rented X-rated movies. Corrin and I worked on the story together. At one point, he thought that an X-rated movie should be rented for research. He was kidding, I think. I hope!

Sometimes, writing a column, was a tough job. The main object of the whole column was to write about news in Geneseo. That meant talking to people, scouring local newsletters, and sometimes editorializing just to fill the space.

Because I wrote the column each week, some people thought that was my main occupation. Because I was paid between $10 to $15 per column, it could never be considered employment. It was a hobby that I enjoyed doing.

During the summer of 1997, I reevaluated my life. I decided writing a column for the Clarion could no longer be. I grew tired of deadlines while still maintaining a real job. It didn't help that my father, David W. Parish, was writing a similar, but better column, for a competing newspaper.

The final straw was when someone compared me to a local radio personality on WHAM. The remark was meant as a complement, but I took as (and still do) as an insult.

Do I miss writing for the Clarion? I must, if I decided to write this column that incidentally, has 555 words. Just like old times.

David A Parish,
Geneseo, N.Y.

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