Jill's Journal: The missing 'L'

Maybe you caught it. Perhaps you didn’t.

It was an honest typo. One we try our best not to make, because a single letter can change the flavor of an entire sentence, thought, or worse yet, an entire word. 

Yep, my proof-reading eyeballs read right over a missing “L” in a word on a front-page headline last week. Our brains are trained to digest words that way, or so I’ve been told. 

Thankfully, it seems a slip of the finger on the keyboard last week didn’t rattle too many of you. There was just a single call on the headline snafu, and just one “I don’t care what you say, this is funny” text message showed up on my phone. By the time the message – and accompanying photo – showed up, I, too, found myself chuckling at the error. The sun, I determined, was going to come up tomorrow, no matter the missing “L” or not.

I’ll admit my heart skipped a beat when Chief Dave Kull called the office after lunch on Wednesday last week. It was clear his eyes had been on the Journal. 

“How’s your day going?” the Chief quizzed.

“OK,” I answered, “What’s up?” 

“Do you have a paper in front of you?” came next.

My heart rate elevated. It’s never good when the local chief of police asks the local newspaper editor, “Do you have a paper in front of you?”

“No, but I’ll grab one,” I worriedly answered.

“Look below the fold …,” advised the Chief.

It only took a second for the missing “L” to pop out to these proof-reading eyes of mine, prompting an “Oh, no!” out of me.

I confessed to the Chief that I was the only one to blame for this blooper; I couldn’t pass it on to the staff. I had typed the headline, in fact I had typed a few versions of the headline before finding one that fit the allotted space. And of course, when I saw that the headline worked, I moved on. It wasn’t until the Chief alerted me to the typo that it quickly became obvious that with an “L” out of the mix, no wonder the headline finally fit.

I’ve never professed to walk on water, well, maybe in the wintertime. But I do my best to avoid icy sidewalks and streets. And I’ll keep typing and proofing headlines – but rest assured, I’ll be keeping a close eye on a missing “L” or any of its alphabet siblings.