Why are you here?

"Why are you here?"
I remember it like it was 2002. Because it was.
I was wearing my one suit. My job interview suit.
It was obvious why I was there.
I told the editor of the paper that I was there to interview for his religion reporter position.
He said, "No. Why are you really here?"
The editor was a philosophy major as an undergraduate. I had a master's degree in journalism and a bachelor's degree in theology. I always preferred theology to philosophy because I thought philosophy wasn't rooted in anything. I may have been wrong.
Anyway, why was I really there?
I thought about it for a second.
I said I was there because Nashville was a diverse and interesting city. It had several black colleges and it was larger than Wichita.
And then the editor's eyes lit up. He started talking about the city he loved. How music city first referred to the Fisk Jubilee Singers.
I think the interview was basically over at that point. I was all right.

I always thought that was a strange question though. Why was I there? Didn't he have a secretary to brief him on why people were meeting in his office?
But I've been thinking a lot lately about ethics and basics and mission statements.
If you can't express that most basic question - why am I here - then you've got problems. If you lose focus of that most basic question - why am I here - then all sorts of other questions start popping up.
Did I go to college for this? That is another question that pops up.

Now, I'm working on making sure I've got better answers for that question. At every moment of every day. Even if the answer is "being here makes me happy."