The Cutting Room Floor #1

One of the most interesting aspects of journalism is also the least talked about: the cutting room floor. I can't count the number of pages of chicken-scratch that have gone unused in stories over the years. Not just partial quotes, erroneous facts and source details with no bearing on the story, but really good stuff that simply got the axe due to word count limitations. These never see life beyond the facing page in a reporter's notebook.

I've been haunted by a moment trimmed from a recent piece. Three weekends back, I covered the Proposition 8 protest in Missoula as part of my ongoing freelance stint with the local alt-weekly. My focus quickly became paternal support for a gay son, but that wasn't the only story I documented that morning.

The crowd marched in a lane-wide column from the Xs at the end of Higgins Street to the court house lawn under the guidance of a local gay rights activist, Jamee G. Along the way I spoke with several individuals about their involvement in the movement. One in particular, Deborah G., informed me she'd been active in rallies in a number of states in the past. For some, Prop 8 was a major setback banning gay marriage in the movement's bastion state of California, a huge blow that took the wind out of the post Obama-win sails. But as everyone pointed out to me that morning, Montana is in dire straights. A person can still lose his or her job based on sexual orientation here.

So what was your initial reaction to the passing of Prop 8 on Nov. 4? I asked Deborah.

She fought to choke back tears, but it all came out. Sobs. Broken sentence fragments. I felt a bit awkward, distanced from her emotional response by the pen and notebook. "It was really sad and it also upset me to see that I don't have the same rights as other people in this country," she managed to say.

I nodded, unsure what to say. She explained how difficult life was, feeling like a "second class citizen." We parted ways when we reached the court house, and I conducted about five more interviews before calling it a day. Though I found a compelling story, the one I submitted to the editor, I didn't find a story with as much raw emotion as Deborah's. Her's was simply too brief, too disjointed from the rest of what I witnessed at the rally.

Amazing what you find on the cutting room floor.