I was in Newtown, Connecticut over the weekend. I have never been so anxious heading to a story as I was on Saturday morning. The tension in the air was palpable and seemed surreal as I drove route 34 into town.

In my thirty+ years as a shooter I can recall crying maybe twice during interviews. I cried on Saturday while shooting an interview with a school board member who hired the principal and teacher Victoria Soto. I cried Sunday when we interviewed the Soto family.

I cried again Monday morning when I called my daughter, a third-grade teacher in Washington, DC, and told her I had a gift from the Soto family for her, a green ribbon that they have given to her for her class. I cried Monday when I wrote the card to my daughter, hailing her as a hero for being so strong for her students.

I cried today when she called me to say how much her students appreciated the card and ribbon, how they put it on her classroom bulletin board, and how her students cried when they wrote notes to the Soto family. I cried at dinner tonight when I related this story to a colleague at dinner

I am angered by hearing that my colleagues were harassed today in Newtown, day three since the shootings, day three of the grieving process when shock, then denial, turns to anger, and that anger is taken out on an easy target, that being us, the press.

I did not enjoy being in Newtown, it is not the highlight of my career. Like you, I had and have a job to do and I did it with class and respect. I am grateful to no longer be there in the town and I am forever changed by having been there.