Is it news yet?

One definition of newsworthiness is something being of sufficient interest to the public or a special audience to warrant press attention or coverage.

I am not sure how I personally would define this shadowy, song and dance, flash pot of a word. What's newsworthy to the person next to me might not resonate at all in my world. When JFK Junior's plane went down in the middle of a stormy, rain-soaked East-Coast night I followed the story for days. I felt for the former President's son, his young wife and her sister. Their designer luggage washed up on shore and was the by product of newsworthiness for days to follow.

When the Russian nuclear sub The Kursk was lost in the Bering Sea signs of life were allegedly evident for a day or two. That country's leader was indecisive; lost in national and personal pride. People lost their lives.

My friend Rose Johnson is dead.

Rose died in Indonesia less than a month ago. One of thirty-plus people who died from drinking rice wine cut with methanol, a small amount of which will kill you, not without much suffering though. Maggie, my girlfriend, and I found out when we logged into Facebook and the message had been posted there. Her death made international news. In Bisbee, friends and acquaintances gathered to mourn her loss. Tonight I joined a group of her friends, local artists and one or two of her former lovers for a celebration of her life.

Was it her death that made Rose newsworthy or was it wonderful life she led? Was it the hundreds and hundreds of colorful and poignant paintings and murals or the graphic details when one's body succumbs to alcohol poisoning that put Rose in the headlines?

I went to work at Cable News Network in 1987. From time to time I found myself finding ways to separate out from the newsworthy product I was helping to produce. For a while I dealt with my third party once removed existence, in the comfortable confines of CNN Center, with sarcasm and an outward persona of callous disinterest. After all I was only there eight to ten hours a day. This did not define me. Nor was I the person fighting my neighbor for a drop of clean water or a few grains of rice. I left CNN two years later, a bit worse for the wear and fairly certain I did not want to work in any form of news gathering again.

In 2001, while sound supervising "Crime and Punishment" for Dick Wolf Productions and NBC News I found myself having similar thoughts to those that arose for me in the late eighties. I love audio recording and everything about it. I also needed the work. But I found that I could not be around producers who high-five each other when a defendant with AIDS was sentenced to life in prison for his part in an accidental shooting. Celebrating over the ratings the episode would receive, the praise that would be heaped upon them and the plum assignments they would be offered.

So, I sit here thinking about Rose. Wishing I had not read the article that detailed her death. I preferred to remember her as I knew her. For the past few days I have been running over some of our conversations. She speaks to me in her strong, distinct English accent.

http://http//www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2009-06-18/news/rose-johnson-the-phoenix-arts-community-mourns-one-of-its-pioneers/

Tehran now dominates the news. People have lost their lives. Bombs still explode in Iraq. I am as interested in these newsworthy world events as most people. What about the two journalists in North Korea facing twelve years of hard labor? Are they less important? Forgotten by assignment editors and news producers until things settle down elsewhere.

So good night Rose. Good night to those who remember people they have lost. Good night to all of us who move through our non-newsworthy but no less significant days.