7/30/2013

Ice Breakers


Gloves, Water and Lifesaver Mints
An ice breaker is a small ship with a hard beak or nose, which are actual nautical terms for the pointy front of a ship. The ice breaker moves in front of a large ship in icy waters breaking the surface of the ice so the large ship can reach dock. That is why we use the term ice breaker as a phrase, word or item used to start a conversation, begin a speech or gain access to someone.
During the winter I keep a case of brown cotton gloves in my back seat. These are the cheep utility-type gloves that run about a buck a pair. During the summer I keep a case of bottled water in my truck, and when I am working I almost always have a pocket full of individual wrapped wintergreen Lifesaver mints.
A call came across the police scanner that emergency crews were being called to the scene of a water tower construction in Willow Park, Texas where a worker was stuck under the tower. The lift cage the welder used to go up under this giant tower jammed and he was stuck under the big bell for an hour in exhausting heat and nobody could figure how to get him down.
I drove to the scene, beating reporters from other media, and as I approached the police officer stopping all traffic from entering the area, I reach back and got a bottle of water out of the back seat. He held his hand out in halt fashion, and as I slowed to a stop and I rolled down my window and stuck a bottle of water right into his hand. “Hey, Thanks.” He said. “Yeah, I thought you would need that,” I said as he uncapped the water and took an eager drink. “Hey, I am from the local paper and I was going to swing in and take a couple of quick pictures if I could. I’m not going to get in anybody’s way.”  He stepped back and waved me on.
I parked away from the gathering fire trucks and police cars just as police began stringing yellow tape around the area. I was the only reporter in the heart of the action. I even stood next to and spoke in amateur Spanish with the stranded worker’s wife when she was brought to the scene. Eventually, a brave firefighter trained in high altitude rescue climbed the ladder shoot to the top of the bell, rappelled by rope down to the stranded worker, attached the worker to his body and rappel to the ground. People cheered as the worker was whisked away in a company truck so I didn’t get a chance to speak with him, but I got great pictures and and quotes no other news unit had because I used a hustle and a bottle of water.
The gloves I carry in the winter are a great ice breaker when I arrive on the scene of an accident or incident. I offer a pair of gloves before speaking to officers. I have arrived at the scene of a frigid highway ice crash and passed out a half-dozen gloves to barehanded firefighters and officers. It helps me get my story and pictures and the emergency responders remember me the next time I am on a scene.
By the way, the water and gloves I use even when I am not working. I seldom pass a homeless person or traveler without offering them either or both, and I have more than once parked my truck and walked quite a way to get to a person I spied under an overpass or in a vacant lot. That has nothing to do with being a Ninja journalist – that is just me. Moving on...
The individual wrapped wintergreen Lifesavers are a great ice breaker to get a person to loosen up and talk with me. I don’t offer them one first, because that is kind of awkward and they would say no. I pull out a handful, unwrap and pop one in my mouth and then offer them one. They usually accept and when they don’t I jokingly try to talk them into it. “Go ahead and take it. You know you want it. Besides, it's wintergreen – it sparks in the dark!” Even when they don’t take one the verbal exchange is enough to them loosen up and get them to talk with me like a friend.
Ice Breaker Part II
I was making my first visit to do an ongoing story about a multi-million dollar county courthouse renovation. The Parker County Courthouse was empty and shut down for two months and all county business was moved to another location while crews gutted the structure, so there was no way I could call the job superintendent to gain access and the county officials only wanted to talk about how wonderful they were for having the renovation done. What a drag.
I drove to the courthouse to make a “cold call” on the courthouse and entered the large, wide-open double front doors. There were workers in hard hats ignoring me as they walked with boards and buckets, but in a small room was a thin man in clean, starched blue jeans leaning back in a chair with his feet on a work table talking on a cell phone. This had to be the foreman! He had his back to the door so he could not see me standing there as he blabbed away to who I gathered was his girl friend. Should I come from behind and interrupt him and take a chance on ruining my relationship with this superintendent? I stood outside the door for another five minutes and he seemed not to be approaching an end to his conversation. I had to do something. Time to call upon super Ninja journalist powers!
The Parker County Courthouse. I used work as an excuse to take helicopter
rides several times. Ninja reporters are clever and get free rides.
I stepped outside and looked around the courthouse square for inspiration. Across the square I spotted a little market and I crossed the street not knowing what I was going to do when I got there. Inside the market was my answer – an old Coca Cola machine with real old fashioned ice cold Cokes in it. I bought two, popped the tops and marched like a confident Ninja to the closed courthouse, only this time I walked right into the room where the foreman was still yammering on the phone, sat a cold Coke right in front of his knee and took a seat in the only other chair in the room and began sipping on my Coke. Not even looking up, he said “I'll call you back. I need to talk to somebody.”
He thanked me for the cold drink as I introduced myself in a friendly manner and asked if this was a good time to talk and take some pictures of "his" work. We talked like friends about his job and my job and I remember at one point saying, “Hey, I want to make you look like a rock star in the paper. Your company is going to did this!”
I made many trips back to the courthouse over the months. The larger paper in the county seat only had bland quotes from county officials each week while I had quotes from the job foreman with amazing photographs from down in the basement to up inside of the majestic clock tower. Anytime I felt it was time to do an update on the courthouse I would call his cell phone and he would say “Come on over, Chris!”

I had access where others couldn’t go because I used my imagination and found an ice breaker – two ice cold bottles of Coke!
I milked that story for months as the courthouse was remodeled, and with my stories and pictures took the readers where they could have never gone. About five years later I gained exclusive access inside the Johnson County Courthouse during its multi-million dollar renovation. And yes, I went all the way up inside that old clock there as well. It's good to be a Ninja journalist.

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