The format of a My Take is 150 words – no more, no less – to express an opinion on a different topic each week. This week’s topic was the cessation of print editions.
When I was growing up, my mother worked for the Montreal Gazette at their offices on Saint-Antoine Street, and the building had giant windows that looked down on the big yellow printing presses from the sidewalk.
I never got to see the presses in action, only visiting in the daytime, but I always looked down and imagined the energy in that room when the time came to go to print. It made starting to work for The Record, years later, feel a bit like coming home.
That old Gazette building is a hotel now and while the big windows are still there there’s no magic left inside, just a lobby.
When I hear about newspapers across the country cutting back their print editions, I can’t help but think of those sleeping giants of childhood and wonder where we’ll find them in the years to come.