Read, every day, something no one else is reading. Think, every day, something no one else is thinking. Do, every day, something no one else would be silly enough to do. It is bad for the mind to be always part of unanimity.

—Christopher Morley

Sometimes, it can be too late.

I found out over Twitter yesterday that one of my journalism instructors, Cynthia Brouse, died after battling breast cancer for years.

I wasn't sure how to feel. Sadness, of course, but mostly I was in shock. For nearly a year, there has been a letter addressed to Cynthia Brouse, sitting in the drafts folder of my email account. In it, I try to articulate how grateful I was for that one day in 3rd year university when she took me out into the hallway before her copy editing and fact checking class to tell me that she saw I had leadership potential  for the Ryerson Review of Journalism, the major magazine I could create with my peers the following year if I stayed within the magazine stream.

I struggled enormously with that decision, and in the end, largely because Cynthia had said out loud to me what I was feeling, I chose the RRJ and 4th year turned out to be not only one of the best learning experiences I had to date, but I formed important bonds and relationships with people I don't think I would have otherwise.

I learned a long time ago that if you have something good to say about a person, you should probably say it in that moment, no matter how silly it may seem or how embarrassed you may feel. Last summer, it dawned on me suddenly if it weren't for those five minutes Cynthia took with me, the remainder of my university career may have turned out very differently—and my love for magazines may not have been as fostered as it was if I had not immersed myself in the Ryerson Review. So I sat down to write Cynthia a thank-you email, knowing she was a religious email checker and responder.

But for whatever reason, I never felt the words were right. I couldn't finish writing what I started. Other things came up in my life, and I thought Cynthia would be there. I would finish it eventually and she'd know just how significant she was in my magazine journalism education. Instead, I'm staring at a Tweet, reading the words "RIP Cynthia Brouse," knowing there is a thank-you letter sitting in my email account that will never be sent and will be there forever, incomplete.

Re: "War journalists will soldier on" by Peter Worthington

This is my response to Worthington's column in the St. Catharine's Standard (http://www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1562454).

I am the writer of the Ryerson Review of Journalism piece, Worthington cites in his article. I understand what he's saying, as I interviewed about 30 Canadian journalists who have gone through a range of war reporting with the Canadian military, including a four-hour long coffee with Matthew Fisher. But while I can see what Worthington's trying to say, I don't agree with a lot of it.

As he cites, in older wars, "embedding" and "unembedding" wasn't a problem for most militaries but the world -- and its militaries -- have changed how they view media, and the new standards of embedding are a reflection of that evolution, as I detailed particularly for the Canadian Forces, re: a peacekeeping nation to the Somalia affair to present day Afghanistan.

"In the old days, that would be considered questionable journalism -- no direct contact with the story, no nuance, no personal assessments, no colour, no feeling for mood or the Taliban environment." Worthington is writing about The Globe and Mail's Talking to the Taliban online doc series (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/talkingtothetaliban). But did he watch the videos at all? Smith has been a reporter in Afghanistan from 2005 to the end of 2008, and in that time has gained a wealth of knowledge about the war, Afghan people, and witnessed how exactly the Canadian military's efforts have changed over the past three years. The videos are filled with everything Worthington cites -- nuance, personal assessments, colour, feeling and mood. And it may not be direct contact, but that doesn't mean Smith didn't have direct contact with Taliban members at all in his three years there. He has run the gamut of doing it himself to having to use fixers for safety reasons.

"A concern for the Canadian military is that a journalist's Afghan 'fixer' may be a potential pipeline for the Taliban into the Canadian base. Journalists babble like brooks, and if the 'fixer' has Taliban links, he's potentially a foil and source of information for the Taliban." That's not really a concern for the military anymore because it now knows that all the fixers hired by the Canadian press have been with the organizations for years. And there has never been a known incident where a fixer betrayed his Canadian reporters. This just sounds like paranoia to me.

"There are cases of 'embedded' journalists being reluctant to go 'outside the wire' for fear of roadside bombs -- some getting their 'fixers' to do leg work for them. Journalists such as Matthew Fisher, who are old school and want to see for themselves, are becoming rare." Every single journalists I interviewed, "new" or "old" school, all said the same thing -- they know the story is off the base and they want to be out with the soldiers on missions; and go with the fixers to speak to Afghans and Taliban members. I think it's an extremely unfair assessment to assume younger journalists are "reluctant" to do the leg work. Take CBC Mellissa Fung's kidnapping in fall 2008. Do you really think this happened to her because she was letting her fixer do the leg work?

"Summed up, a journalist in Afghanistan who is not embedded with the military is incapable of getting the whole story, and is far more likely to be captive of what he or she is told by the Taliban, who are adept at using the media in a way our military wouldn't dare." I question this final thought, because nowhere in the entire article did Worthington prove or give an example of how the Taliban has manipulated the media in its favour in comparison to the military.

I think Canadian journalists strive every day with how to do better with the Afghanistan story. And they constantly acknowledge and struggle with the fact that it is an incomplete story they have to show. Fisher also admitted to him being unable to tell the whole story. And now NATO is barring journalists from travel in Afghanistan (http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5gXHes62vbQP-5axfjuEYw2Bk-_2w), and are being required to submit to biometric scans before they can even get access to military bases (http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5j9cLtJIfUbcjaR7pHDV9uIs4hR7A).

So I think we need to look at the politics and military when trying to understand how the Afghanistan story is being covered (which I tried to do in my piece). It's too one-sided to say the blame lies entirely with these "new embedded" journalists.