Category: Aging

WEAR IT TO A WEDDING; CARHOPS AT THE DRIVE IN; BLOGGING BOOMERS CARNIVAL #65

Lifetwo The Amazing Riveting Blogging Boomers Carnival hits #65 this week at LifeTwo with pieces on everything from Fifties Drive-Ins to looking great at a wedding this summer to conversion to Orthodox Judaism (that’s mine.)  The Carnival is free; bring your own cotton candy.

THE PLACE TO BE: ROGER MUDD’S NEW BOOK AND SO MANY MEMORIES

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In 1968, when I was working in the McCarthy Campaign against the Vietnam War, one of the producers traveling with the campaign asked me to come work with her at the CBS News Washington Bureau when the campaign ended.  I was thrilled.  I had, however, no idea how thrilled I really should be. Imagine a 21-year-old, just out of college and the trauma of the riots in Chicago and McCarthy’s loss of the Democratic nomination (yes, we knew it would happen, but not in our hearts), walking through the door of 2020 M St. NW – the august CBS News Washington Bureau — (Walter Cronkite‘s Washington Bureau!) because I had a job there.

Working there when I showed up: Bruce Morton, Bob Schieffer, George Herman, Daniel Schorr, Eric Sevareid, Dan Rather, Marvin Kalb and his brother Bernie... and my mentor and friend Roger Mudd.  They were, really, giants (yes, I know they were all men.  Marya McLaughlin died a long time ago; Leslie Stahl arrived a couple of years later).  CBS News ruled the Hill and the White House and everywhere else inside the beltway.  And we did it with enormous scruples; I was trained to be a journalist by these guys, as well as Bureau Chief Bill Small and Face the Nation Producer Sylvia Westerman.  And have been grateful the rest of my life for the privilege.

Roger wrote a book about those years — it’s called The Place to Be because, really, that’s what the bureau was in those days.  And last night, on publication day, there was a party. It was better than a class reunion.  Everyone from the teen-aged desk assistant (now I think in his 40s) to the Washington director  to the octogenarian make-up lady, to those guys we’ve all heard of, were there.  All having a blast remembering those remarkable years.

I’ve been out of the daily news business for some time, and in a way the party reminded me why.  The classy, funny, unpretentious, smart, great people who taught me how to listen and pay attention, ask questions and check my sources, feed the crew first and never leave a person without getting their phone number… I hate to sound like an old fogey but there really aren’t so many like that any more.  For me, Roger is the dean of all of them, not only because I know him best but also because of his deep sense of honor and love of history, humor, curiosity and devotion to his family, and his unfailing kindness and generosity to me.  It was wonderful to hear everyone so happy and proud for him, glad he’d finally written down some of the historic understanding and institutional memory we all treasure. 

I suppose it’s the same when anyone we love finds special success – a promotion, a graduation, a painting or a no-hitter, for that matter.  But because of what’s become of the news business, because it’s now so much more business than news, because of the great joy and pride we felt and how hard we worked to earn the right to feel it, I felt a special warmth and longing last night: grateful for the opportunity I had to share what is universally regarded as a golden moment in journalism – those years in the Washington Bureau — and so very sorry that it’s so hard to find that gold – any gold — anymore.

TIME PASSES: HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO A LONG-TIME FRIEND

Mudd_blurrySaturday night we went to an 80th birthday party.  It was for someone whose 43rd we’d also attended — a long time to know someone.  He’s a wonderful man with a wonderful family, and you would know his name if I wrote it here – but it was his party not mine and somehow it feels intrusive to tell you who he is. 

When I was first in the news business, he taught me a great deal.  Ever courtly and generous, excellent at what he did, he shared so much of what he knew and felt about news, politics, government and life.  With humor.  And a gentle sense of irony.  I wish I could communicate how thrilling it was to wander through the tunnels under the Senate, past the secret offices where senators met for gumbo and whiskey, around the corner called "coffin corner" because when the dead lay in state, the coffin had to be tipped vertically to get around the corner on its way to the Rotunda that was its destination — with this gifted man as my guide.

All his kids were at the party of course, along with their spouses and a ton of grandchildren.  All four kids were younger than these grandkids when they attended our wedding.  There were (very short and funny) speeches, lots of teasing, and not an ounce of pretense or artifice.  Of course, the fact that all of them were so happy to see me after our long sojourn in California and year on separate paths, made me feel great.  Even so, the great gift of this evening was that I didn’t even think of that until later.  When you share so much of life, and work, affection and high regard with someone,  you have the luxury of honoring them without obsessing about what it all means to you.  That should tell you more about him than anything. 

SAD MUSIC, GREAT BIG SEA, STONE PONIES, BEATLES – RIDING THE WAYBACK MACHINE

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Have you ever heard a song that caught you up short and brought you almost to tears?  Boston to St. John — sung by Great Big Sea, does that to me, no matter how many times I hear it.  In fact, when we pass over St. John on the way to Europe and it shows up on the map on the little TV, I get weepy just hearing it in my head.  What is it about this romantic, acoustic song accompanied by a pipe and a guitar?  Just listen (this one has lyrics posted) – it’s a nice thing to end the week with.

I don’t think I’ll ever get over the wonder of what music has come to mean to me, again.  Of course I was a typical teen fan, and then in my college years obsessed with Bob Dylan, the Beatles, The Doors, Cream, anything by Ellie Greenwich, anything from Motown, Linda Ronstadt (especially the Stone Ponies phase) – listen to this primo girl song:

I also loved the great folkies like Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, Phil Ochs, Judy Collins, Joan Baez ( oh – and Peter, Paul and Mary (need I go on?) and Simon and Garfunkel — among others.  Then I went into semi-retirement.  I made mix tapes for my kids – Good Day Sunshine, Hippy Hippy Shake, Here Comes the Sun, the Garden Song, Carolina… you name it.  And we sang a lot.  But the deep, gut-wrenching feeling you get when the music drills right to the center of your soul — that all came back more recently.  And differently.  Once, my Deadhead son asked me why I had never gone to one of their concerts.  The answer was peculiar, I guess.  I heard all my music for free at marches.  And peace rallies.  Who needed to buy tickets? 

The music was, literally, the soundtrack to my life.  Every song I hear pulls a movie into my head — me on a bus to Manhattan for a march, in a boat on Paradise Pond with my boyfriend, dancing like crazy someplace or other.  Now, though, the music seems to bring the mood to me, rather than meeting it half way.  I can be moved from zero to 60 – solid to weepy – in about one chorus.  Maybe it’s the passage of time.  Maybe it’s that I hear far more of it alone.  Maybe it’s just that much of what I listen to evokes other times in my life.  Today, driving home, I had my iPod plugged into the car radio, on random shuffle, and Pete Seeger singing All My Life’s a Circle did it. Again. 

Of course, anything from the Juno soundtrack just makes me laugh.  And lots of Bruce just makes me want to dance.  It’s not all sad stuff.  I guess I should try to figure it out, but I’d rather just think I’m newly available, or RE-newly available, to those feelings.  And be grateful for the music that brings them.