Just before the holidays, I was asked to write up something that covers everything I thought people should pay attention to in the new year.
Because I'd received a lot of positive reaction to the new format for my daily blotter (but had to stop the new format after I gave notice at The Times), I decided to write it the way people liked one last time.
Although other reporters' work was published, mine wasn't.
But I wrote it, so I thought it deserved at least a few eyes on it.
Just keep in mind that, like all my blog posts, this is something I wrote fairly quickly and it hasn't been edited...
Having reported on breaking news — mainly covering crime, courts and public safety — for The Times in 2016, I've seen some of the worst sides of human nature, but I've also seen some of the best.
In the wake of floods, shootings and senseless acts of violence, I've watched the men and women of northwest Louisiana come together - every time I thought the concept of humanity was lost somewhere along the course of the year, I was proven wrong.
It reminds me of my favorite quote.
"In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery and death."
Anne Frank wrote that.
In the attic.
And if she can have those thoughts and that attitude in the face of such horror and atrocity, I believe I can face anything with hope.
We all can.
My hope is that the unforeseen spike in crime this year was only a blip on the radar. I hope the number of homicides future crime reporters have to write about in the coming year will never again come near the elevated numbers of 2016. In fact, it would be nice if there weren't even one for an entire year.
If the homicide rate does begin to escalate in another trend, my wish is that the people of northwest Louisiana will band together to stop it.
On social media, we've seen a sudden uptick in behind-the-shades reporters engaging their neighbors with information on criminal elements within their communities.
Although I think this can be a good thing — people need to be informed — I believe it can also be a dangerous thing, especially when reports from friends and neighbors border on the prejudicial or downright ugly. It's important for people to know their community is watching. It's not important to tell people that minorities are walking down the street nearby - such information has absolutely no bearing on making a neighborhood safer.
Property crimes, especially in some of the areas more affluent areas, seem to be increasing as well.
But I think 2017 will show us that more community policing - which I believe Shreveport's new police chief will continue to increase - will make a world of difference. Not necessarily by preventing crimes, but definitely by helping to bring justice as needed.
Of course, I'm not an expert.
I'm just a journalist.
I don't create the facts, my only function is to report them, and I've spent the past year honing my craft in an effort to get better at it.
My heroes in the field are — of course — Woodward and Bernstein and Cronkite and Murrow, but they're also Joan Didion and Hunter S. Thompson, Gay Talese and Tom Wolfe, Nora Ephron and Dominick Dunne (not to mention all the Jackie Collins, Harold Robbins and Sidney Sheldon I like to read). None of them got it right 100 percent of the time, but they did the best they could and they constantly worked to do better.
They're all what journalists should be: students of the world, writing as objectively as possible on everything within view — allowing their readers to make up their own minds.
As I write these words, I'm in my final days in Shreveport.
Louisiana has been my home for every step of my personal and professional life, and I will always treasure my time in what I believe is the greatest state in the nation.
But the time has come for me to move on and see whether my wings will carry me as I spread them in the Pacific northwest.
I hope I'm leaving my hometown in very capable hands, and I hope it's only better the next time I'm here to visit.
Until then, stay safe, be nice to each other and don't forget to make time to enjoy this wonderful world we have here.
And try not to end up in the next crime reporter's blotter.
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