Letting the light in

Farideh Dada (left) and Kim Alleyne, her newsroom buddy.


I never noticed the importance of news headlines until I was assigned to read stories and write them. The most difficult part of the copy-editing job for me: To write headlines for opinion pieces.

During the first few days I had a hard time shrinking pieces of information gathered in a story and writing the gist of them in one line – a headline.

On those stressful days, one who was warming my heart and giving me courage and hope was a Chipster, my buddy, Kim Alleyne (2005 Scholar).

One day, during the first week of my internship, I was a little frustrated trying to write a headline for an editorial piece. I felt choked, but I didn’t let it out.

I left my desk for a few minutes, advice Kim had given me earlier: Take a break when you get stuck.

When I returned to my desk, I was surprised by a beautiful yellow-purple greeting card on my computer’s keyboard. Written in fine handwriting was: “Sweet Farideh, take a deep breath and soak up the wonderful experience. Editing is a very important work, but it takes practice. … This craft takes time, and I think no one ever reaches total perfection, though our perfection lies in our efforts and courage to learn and be better…”

This little piece of handwriting had such a strong vigor that revitalized my mind more than any other break could. Those promising words gave me more confidence, courage and enthusiasm to learn, learn and learn and not to expect to attain perfection. One should work hard toward perfection but should never insist on being perfect. As novelist and songwriter Leonard Cohen puts in, “There is a crack, a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.”

-- Farideh Dada, San Jose State University, Calif., Poughkeepsie (N.Y.) Journal