Goodbye, Lake County

Well, Lake County friends, this is a goodbye. After the newspaper you hold in your hands is printed, I no longer will be the editor of the Lake County News-Chronicle. For personal reasons, I’ve decided to leave my post here in Two Harbors and explore what there is to be done in the world of working adults besides being a journalist.

It’s been an interesting and challenging year since I first stepped foot in the News-Chronicle office as a recent college graduate and newly hired reporter. I can say I learned more in my first year as a full-time newspaper employee than I ever have sitting in a classroom.

My time in Two Harbors wasn’t all work and no fun, though. I had a lot of great times being able to cover various stories up and down the shoreline.

I remember one of my first stories, talking with Curt Anderson, the former owner of Harbor Bowl in downtown Two Harbors. The story kicked off a busy summer full of festivals, races, a government shutdown, and eventually a huge forest fire in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. I certainly never, ever was bored while I worked for the News-Chronicle.

While all of us will leave jobs and get new ones from time to time in our lives, I’ve learned that when a person in a leadership role leaves their job — especially if they are responsible for informing the county of all things happening, or not happining for that matter — the transition can be somewhat rough. Me leaving my job can affect many people that I’ve never even met; people that pick up this paper week after week and expect to read quality stories in the newspaper. So it goes without saying that this was not an easy decision for me to make.

I’ll miss the chitchatting as everyone stops in on a Thursday morning to pick up the freshly printed newspapers. I’ll miss my coworkers in Two Harbors.

I trust and hope that who's hired to replace me embraces this job and Lake County with the same enthusiasm as I did when I first settled in as a reporter.

For those of you who still will crave to read my work, I anticipate that you will continue to see my work in local publications as I intend to take up freelance writing as a hobby.

Until then, goodbye.

Brittany Berrens was the editor and a reporter at the Lake County News-Chronicle.

Tags: two harbors, lake county, opinion, editorials, columns, columnists