Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Free as a bird

Many of the Weekly's arts writers are freelancers. This makes for a nice mix of voices and experiences, as the writers bring their spark from different walks of life. For example, we've got a film teacher and a drama teacher, a seasoned journalist and a chap from the nonprofit world who only recently discovered his knack for newspapering.

Janet Silver Ghent has been working with me for just a few stories, but she's also one of the said seasoned journalists. Previously, she was senior editor at j. (a.k.a. the Jewish news weekly of Northern California).

With freelancers, you get to enjoy the stories they write for other publications. Such as one of Janet's recent j. columns, which she told me was about the difficulty of finding narrow shoes.

But there was much more to this cleverly woven piece. In a polarized world where people wield words like two-by-fours ("Golly, did I smash you in the forehead with my polemics?"), Janet is that rare bird, someone who can mix political issues with gentle humor. Check it out here.

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