Reclamation – Part 1

Maybe you’ve read my blog before. Maybe you’ve said to yourself “Jesus… this guy is a major downer”.  I am, right now. It’s been a rough year.  Quite a few friends have passed on to something (hopefully) better than this life.  At my age, you start seeing that in small increments, but this year… oh fuck… this year. I didn’t expect all of that, all at once. Nobody I know did. Some went very quickly and quietly… very aggressive cancer, an accident… an overdose… 3 of them went harder… gasping for air … COVID. Death is hardest on those who get left behind. I figure…when I’m dead… I won’t mind so much, since I’ll be the last to know.  But there’s a sort of death that happens among the living… it happens in our memories. Remembering who they were…FOR them… that’s hard. Being entrusted with legacies… as we all are… is both cruel and beautiful all at once.  

I wrote previously about being tired. I still am.  But the more I sit here… the more morose and twistedly pathetic that becomes. I went off the air last March.  I said “that’s it” and I didn’t say “goodbye”.  I pushed the microphone out of my way that morning…and ran “best of” broadcasts ever since. Sometime in August, my friend Kerry said “I wanna hear a new Morning Show”. I should have done it just for her… because she’s been dead for a month now… just when she was finally happy in her own life, in her own skin and in love with her new husband. Her last words to me were “They’re talking about putting me on a vent today”.  

She wouldn’t have wanted me to walk away from that old dream of mine. No matter how many new dreams come to me… you can’t shove shit that you love in a closet and slam the door tight. Sooner or later… you have to take an inventory… and you realize how much is missing in your life.  It’s been a hard year. 

Hey, did I mention it’s been a hard year?  The studio is in pieces all over the house. True story.  It’s literally in pieces because it flooded on March 27.  We’re still fighting to get the repairs complete, 7 months later.  But after talking to my wife, the staff that still work the boards and push the programs out… Charme, and some others… I’ve decided that, if I have to do the show from the goddamned bathroom toilet…. that’s what I’m gonna do.   The goal is to have us back up and running and doing new shows by my birthday.  But things will be changing, at least for me…

My job, as I envisioned it 20 years ago, when this whole thing started… was to entertain you… keep the show moving…. keep you smiling.  It’s hard to be the class clown when so much of what’s going on in my life (indeed, in this world)… is shit. Life isn’t a comedy hour. And I’ve never been any good at juggling while dressed up as a big ol’ circus attraction.  So if that’s what I’m “supposed to be”… I decline. From now on…. I decline.  The music will still be there… the memories will still be there… but I think I want to talk to my listeners. I think I want to connect with people. I think there’s so much to say.

Getting old is a drag and a half, man.  This year… my health, that of my wife’s too… well… things are changing…. slowing down a little, and sometimes that isn’t a bad thing.  It’s just what it is.  Because we’re both considered “high risk” for COVID… we’re still spending a good deal of our time isolating…. long after many have tossed their masks off and decided it’s “sweet freedom” time for them; never realizing that by doing that, they’re still carrying the virus and making it MORE risky for people like us.  Seems like a good time to re-tool, re-group and re-visit an old passion of mine.  So that’s the goal. November 15th. Morning Show. In the meantime, check out Sharon’s RetroOasis and HitMix with Charme every weekday at noon and 3pm EST.  

Peace.