You don’t fully realize it, then, because all you know is what you know.

But I know it now.

Most kids — probably all kids — grow up wanting to be like their parents.

It looks different to all, but, to me, it looked — and still looks — a little bit dusty, with dark smears on my hand.

I was a newspaper kid.

My mom, The News’ Lifestyles editor, had her office upstairs, in the newsroom. That was the place where I bounced around in awe. The sound of keyboards clicking. The buzz of the radio scanner. The giant bound volumes that contained all of my town’s history, stored against one wall of the most historical business in the region.

My dad, his office was downstairs. I thought it was the most grand and impressive office I’ve ever seen. A nod to his love of the outdoors, fishing and woodsy artifacts filled it. I roamed around there growing up, watching the composition department use light tables to carefully create the next day’s ads. Watching the big, dusty press wind and roll out the next day’s paper. Even hanging around in the bowels of the building with a ball glove in hand, taking winter grounders with my dad in between giant rolls of newsprint.

Like many children, I thought my dad was the most important person in town. He probably wasn’t, but the hindsight of adulthood has me realizing he was pretty close to it.

A community-first publisher, my dad has steered The Alpena News since moving my family from Ohio in 1988.

This week will be his last in the role, as Bill Speer retires from a career with Ogden Newspapers that started when he graduated from West Virginia University.

I have more respect for him than I could ever articulate. Somehow, he managed a thriving newspaper and found time to make an impact on multiple community and church boards. Somehow, he still found time to coach my brother and me in baseball, football, basketball, and soccer. Somehow, he was home every night for dinner and never missed one of our games.

Kids want to be like their parents, but, as is natural in life, many find their own path. That is not a bad thing.

For a few, that desire to be like their parents never goes away. I count myself one of those.

At first, I wanted to forge my own similar-but-different path, and spent the first 13-plus years of my career working for a different company in a different town. I was going to be a journalist, but in a different way than my parents — I was going to focus on sports.

But, toward the last few years of my past employer, something funny happened.

I love talking to people in the community. I like solving problems. I enjoy helping get the most out of the people I work with.

Wait a second … maybe, leading a newspaper is the right thing for me.

So I made the decision to learn as much as I could about the business to prepare me for the role I’m in now — newspaper publisher.

Of course, I wanted to be like my dad in those years, watching the creation of the newspaper with a boy’s wonder.

But, even more than then, I want to continue in my father’s footsteps as an adult.

It has been the pleasure of my life to work alongside my father for the past year-and-a-half, us having the same job in different states. I’ll miss those publishers’ Zoom calls during which I scroll on my screen and see my hero cast behind that recognizable, cabin-feeling office.

Another person will now grace that office, Justin Hinkley, a young former editor turned publisher, just like myself. He is someone who has followed a similar path to mine, and who has undoubtedly learned much from my dad, just as I have.

The hallmark of the news industry is its persistence. Every night, that old, dusty press cranks and The News spreads through the community. Just as life is, a newspaper is bigger than any one of us. The show will go on, and it will go on just fine when Mr. Speer wakes up that first Monday of retirement.

I’m certain his influence and legacy will live on in Alpena, and I’m certain it lives on with me. I sit here in my office, penning my column, like my mentor has done almost every week of his career. His wisdom, his integrity, his passion are things I draw on each and every day.

Looking back at my childhood, it all makes sense.

I am just a guy who simply never stopped wanting to be like his dad.

Jeremy Speer is the publisher of The Courier in Findlay, Ohio, The Advertiser-Tribune in Tiffin, Ohio, and the Review Times in Fostoria, Ohio. He can be reached at jeremyspeer@thecourier.com or jspeer@advertiser-tribune.com.