A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Party!

I found the following story when I was going through some books that I am working on. This is from a book of funny things that happened to me when I was working at the newspaper. Maybe I will have it published before Christmas. It is tentatively titled “Stop the Presses!: Funny Stories from My Life as a Reporter.” I wrote it a couple of years ago. It is a story of me as a “cub” reporter and a story that I thought I could not right about. My pale skin was beet red that day. I hope you enjoy this story and the humor in it.

I was shocked when I got the call…I was puzzled…I was mortified…but, I was a little more than intrigued when I got the invitation.

“We would like you to come cover our party and take pictures,” the voice on the other end of the phone said.

My mind couldn’t get ahold of what kind of party that she was talking about. Had I heard her right?

“We would like you to come and take pictures at our breastfeeding party,” she had said.

Okay. One part of me was wanted to say, “We can’t put those photos in the newspaper” and hang up the phone on her. The other part was curious as to what exactly a “breastfeeding party” was. So what if I wouldn’t be able to run the photos?

“What time is the party and where will it be?” was the question that came out of my mouth.

“Two o’clock at the ag center,” was the answer at the other end.

I breathed a sigh of relief. If they were having the party at the agricultural center (known to locals as “the Cow Palace”) it made sense that there would be cows there feeding their calves. I had grown up on a dairy farm and had seen that hundreds of times.

I showed up at the Cow Palace with my trusty old 35 mm camera in hand, as well as a notebook. When I went in, there were women and babies everywhere. I know that I must have turned beet red.

I can tell you however that I never saw a single bare breast that day. I saw potato chips and soft drinks and listened to someone talk how healthy breastfeeding was, compared to bottle feeding. There was not even a slideshow.

I took a few photos of the mothers and babies and ate some chips. I then went back and wrote up the story for the newspaper with relief washing over me.

I did get a memory that I would be able to share – or should I say, mammary?

 

 

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