The basement is where secrets lie and valuable treasures can exist. It’s where the Boogeyman lives, where ghosts, and goblins roam at night. It’s where that old Atari system from 1982 and game cartridges sit aging in a flimsy cardboard box and your old Doors, Led Zepplin, and ELO records collect dust on a shelf. The basement is where you set up that ping pong table 8 years ago (I swear I was going to play it everyday).

It’s also where your dad’s old Johnny Mathis, Beatles, Mitch Miller, and Dixieland records rest in that box marked “Dad’s old records.” It’s where your deceased father-in-law’s “Teacher of the Year” award is buried at the bottom of a musty smelling 47-year-old box, where some long-gone relative’s gold pocket watch from 1889 rests on a shelf, and where your dad’s old fishing tackle box from 1974 sits in a corner.

Now, I have a very neat and organized unfinished basement, complete with four 72-inch-tall shelves that holds a majority of belongings stored there. In every box, crate and envelope stored on these shelves are hundreds of stories to tell. It’s also where I do much of my writing.

Here’s what I found there today: my college freshman year Journalism 101 text book, History of American Journalism, circa 1986. It details exactly what the title says — history of American journalism, covering such publishing greats as William Randolph Hearst, Joseph Pulitzer, the rise of the New York Times and Washington Post, yellow journalism, sensationalism of the press, and documenting wars and some of the biggest stories in world history. Sounds so sexy right?

The book wasn’t, but my journalism career was. My career as a news reporter gave me about a thousand stories to tell, and most of those stories still reside on the pages of newsprint for the many newspapers where I worked from 1986 to 1998. I have about 100 copies of issues still remaining in my well-preserved archive and just about every article that I ever wrote clipped and filed away. This was a time before Al Gore’s internet existed, so very few of my actual articles can be found online.

This is my first post-journalist blog. It’s an introduction to you and what I plan to tell and believe me, it’s big….I’m giving away where Jimmy Hoffa is buried. The answer: somewhere on Earth. I think!

In the case of most unfinished basements, it’s where things on the cusp of being thrown into the garbage get one more chance at “life.” In our case, the majority of items in the basement belonged to our parents, or mementos left over from our high school and college days. What’s really cool is that behind every old trophy, album, family photograph, toy, memento, and newspaper article is a story behind it. And through my upcoming blogs, I’ll share these stories with you along with commentary that relates to current times, plus some musings about the funny and serious events in life, around town, and in the news.

Who am I to tell these stories? I’m a 1989 journalism grad from Eastern Michigan University, former news reporter for more than 10 years, winner of multiple awards from the Michigan Press Association, Illinois Press Association, and National Newspaper Association. I converted to the dark side of advertising in 2000 where I have been Director of Sales and Marketing at a media company — plus a former youth baseball coach, soccer coach, a fan of Game of Thrones, Seinfeld, the Detroit Red Wings, and a self-proclaimed humorist.

I’m a husband to my wife, Sue, dad to my son, Justin, dad to my daughter, Liz, and dad to a puppy named Noah. In my journalism career I considered myself one of the last remaining objective journalists in the business. I was a member of the Society of Professional Journalists, an organization dedicated to the practice of journalism and committed to high standards of ethical behavior. I reported the news honestly and objectively. My job as a journalist was to inform the reader, be an impartial observer, record history, and not be a cheerleader for one side or the other.

Ok — that’s out of the way.

I hope my stories entertain you, captivate you, be inspiring, bring out some discussions, and encourage you to look through your basement to find relics that hold some very interesting stories.

Let the journey begin.

Next up — the story of Birdie, a baby bird trapped and on the verge of death until….