To be only three days into my new position with The Selma Times-Journal, it seems like an incredible amount of time has passed and an uncountable number of hands have passed through my own.

Already, people are beginning to recognize me and talk to me as if they’ve known me for years, a fact I attribute to the general good nature of the people who call Selma home, and sharing with me the ups and downs of their lives.

Obviously, election season is one of the most exciting times to be a journalist and I had the good fortune to join the local news team just in time for its final climax.

On Monday, I covered my first story for the newspaper which led me down to Tabernacle Baptist Church and gave me the pleasure of meeting some of Selma’s foremost activists and visionaries with the Selma Center for Nonviolence, Truth and Reconciliation (Selma CNTR) – though they had never seen me before, they sparked up conversations with ease and welcomed me to the community.

The next night, after meeting a room full of wonderful people raising funds to fight breast cancer, I ran into many of these same people as they awaited the arrival of then-candidate Malika Sanders-Fortier at Selma’s premiere sweets shop, Sweet Advantages.

Silky Slim, whom I saw speak on Monday, took the time to shake my hand and thank me for the only news article I’d thus far contributed to the local narrative; locals struck up conversations about politics, city conflict, family and everything in between; children smiled and I took deep breaths of the city air as I walked along Broad Street to and from the Times-Journal office.

Wednesday morning, I ran into several of these same people on my way to The Coffee Shoppe – a place that I can only imagine will begin to see a lot of me over the coming weeks – while they were demonstrating outside of City Hall. They greeted me as a friend, not a journalist, and talked seriously and intimately with me about their deepest concerns and hopes.

Three days and already I feel at home – I’ve sang along to songs of empowerment on the steps of a historic church, reveled in the election of a hometown hero in a small ice cream shop, strolled the streets of downtown Selma in rain and darkness, stood alongside worried yet hopeful workers and downed coffee and pastries at a local café.

Too bad one can’t be the new guy forever.