I am very romantic about journalism.
I have wanted to be a journalist since I was a child. The very first time I went to the Orillia Cinema Four to watch the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie with my younger brother, I saw fictional journalist April O’Neil, her red hair and fierce attitude propelling her into countless situations in pursuit of the truth, or turtles, or pizza! I knew what I wanted to do.
But epilepsy had different ideas.
A head injury at 12, and my first seizure at 13. Doctors telling me what I will never be able to do.
Never tell Jenny what she can’t do.
The only thing from that doctor’s list that I have not overcome is my ability to drive a car. It was the one thing that initially prevented me from becoming a journalist — you can’t get hired if you can’t chase a story, or if you can’t be on scene at a moment’s notice.
I didn’t pursue journalism for that reason; I thought I could find something similar and work that way.
But then I entered my 20s, and my head injury – left untreated, before the days of post-concussion and Traumatic Brain Injuries – made work impossible. Well, not the working so much as just getting hired.
Never tell Jenny what she can’t do.
My husband travelled across the North for work, keeping me fed, sheltered and deeply cared for; He would spend his off time searching second-hand stores to find me textbooks.
I taught myself to write by answering the questions in the activities at the end of the chapters. When I felt like I was ready, I wrote an essay for the CBC. Not only was it chosen to be read, but I recorded it myself for the national broadcast. It was then picked up for a English University textbook.
I got a piece published in a textbook, just like the ones I had been studying. I couldn’t stop staring at it.
Then, I read all the other essays, too, and did the activities at the end of the chapter.
From then, I sent my first query letter. About 13 years of freelance writing later, I sent a query about garlic planting to my current editor, and not only did he take it, but it began a relationship that offers me room to learn and grow, and also someone who has faith in me and respect for my work.
I stand on the foundations built by many people: my family, my husband’s family, and our beloved friends. I have grown up with privilege and it is now my privilege to share the stories of those with less social power than I.
As a disability activist, co-founder of Epilepsy Sudbury, champion of context and a ‘clipboard kid’ who always had a petition for you to sign, I could not be happier to cover the Communities Beat. I am also thrilled to be working for a community media network that not only knows the importance of local news, but one that would give a shot to a self-taught April O’Neil, like me.
Jenny Lamothe is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter at Sudbry.com. She’s on the Communities beat, covering issues in the Black, immigrant, Indigenous and Francophone communities.
