The weeks between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day are also the time for high-school and college graduations, which often involve visits from grandparents. That makes this a time for generations to get together so they don’t make the mistake I made.

Here’s my error: From the time I turned an arrogant 13, my father and I didn’t talk much. Looking back now, it seems unbelievable that when I flew from Texas to Massachusetts in 1984 to visit my parents for a week as he was dying of cancer, we didn’t talk for more than minutes about anything important, and I didn’t ask him questions about his own past.

Oh, I did try a couple of times to evangelize him, but he was proud of his Jewishness, even though he did not revere the Bible. So why didn’t I ask about growing up in the 1930s? Why didn’t I ask whether the Nazis murdered his grandparents? Looking back, it seems bizarre that while visiting home in 1984 I spent a day near Harvard questioning an old public relations pioneer, Edward Bernays, for a history book I was writing, but didn’t do the same with my own father.

Why didn’t I ask [my father] whether the Nazis murdered his grandparents?

My wife was much wiser: When her father was also dying of cancer, he gave her the family genealogy and his own reminiscences. That’s something his descendants will have. So, if you have time to sit down with grandparents during graduation festivities, or if you’re living with or close to your parents, this column is for you: Don’t miss a great opportunity. Get the family stories while you still can. Use a smartphone or tape recorder. Helpful apps are now available. Lots of good questions to ask are at legacyproject.org/guides/lifeintquestions.html. Remember to label photographs.

Parents and grandparents, you might send this column to your children or grandchildren. If that seems too direct, leave it lying on a coffee table when the kids come to visit, the way my father left on the coffee table for me a book entitled How to Tell Your Children About Sex.

Who wants to be a reporter?

Several times a year I receive emails from men and women who majored in journalism or worked on college newspapers but then headed in different directions. The notes typically begin this way: “I like business but I miss journalism.” No surprise: Reporters are often dollar-poor but stimulation-rich from encountering interesting people and places. Since full-time and fully paid reporters’ jobs are hard to find, an ex-newsroom diaspora has grown, along with considerable discontent.

The good news: Generous donors make it possible for the World Journalism Institute to train each year 14 college juniors or seniors—and we’re thinking of expanding that program. My wife and I personally train in our home each year 10-20 adults who have succeeded in non-journalism careers but want new adventures. WJI graduates, younger and older, produce 70 percent of what you read in our magazine and on our website, and some of what you hear on our daily radio program. We have placed grads in roughly 250 print, radio, television, and digital newsrooms, both secular and Christian, ranging from small-town weeklies to The Washington Post.

Among the mid-career adults, we’ve learned that applicants with previous reporting experience and enjoyment are the most likely to succeed. Those wanting to write opinion columns or devotional material are the least likely. So, if you once pounded the pavement in pursuit of stories, stopped to take on more remunerative employment or to grow a family, but are now in position to be a once-a-week, poorly paid but highly stimulated WORLD correspondent, go to worldji.com and apply. If I’ve turned you down in previous years but you really want to do some reporting and now have examples to show, please email me again.

One other request: We teach high-potential college students during the second half of this month and offer several of them paid WORLD internships, but we can’t do that for every good student (and some anyway want to try working in secular newsrooms). If you work at a newspaper, website, or radio station, small or large, and have an internship to offer, preferably with a little pay, please let me know. We need Christians everywhere.

Email molasky@wng.org