Rick Minerd - Life Is A Jukebox

When it's early in the morning as it is now,  after I've done everything else I either needed to do, or wanted to do, and I sit down in front of this key board I simply think of something,  or someone on my mind and try to craft a bunch of words that will hopefully tell some sort of story.

After spending more time than I probably should have this morning listening to old tape recordings of various radio shows and different Disk Jockey's I've known through the years I came across a tape of Scott Norman, a  WCOL  DJ from 1984.

Scott was one of the last in a long line of talented  WCOL morning jocks before the station morphed into it's first go around as a Talk Radio station.

Carrying on the tradition of guy's before him like J.Parker Antrim,  Wes Hopkins and Johnny Hill,  he was a funny guy.

But like so many other's, Scott didn't stick around long enough, and when he left I replaced him on the morning show for a brief period.

Back when radio was fun to listen to stations didn't need "teams" of announcer's to get the listener's up in the morning.

No zoo's or crews,  just a friendly voice who had a knack for bantering about the weather on it's way or the overnight developments that morning risers might find interesting,  and of course someone to keep time and offer a little commentary about the music they were playing.

Even I could do that.

Another tape I came across had a couple of  WMNI  DJ's I worked with,  Joe Maxwell and  Mike Taylor.

A couple of young guy's who also didn't stick around long enough.

On the tape I am heard interrupting Maxwell's show by introducing him to a new pup that I had gotten that day.

Joe is asking what my new  Boxer's name was and  I'm explaining to him that I named him "Stargell" after my favorite baseball player.

Joe remarked that the dog did resemble Willy Stargell and I'm asking if it's because of the round Black face or the stout Brown body, and after a long pause he says, "Okay, you probably just got us both fired."

Priceless.

On the same tape Mike Taylor is saying goodbye for the night and introducing my show coming up next,  he then starts his next record on the wrong speed and tries to shift the gear lever to set it on the correct speed and somehow knocks the tone arm off the record.

It was a beautiful moment.

Through the years I have kept a lot of tapes of people I've worked with and still get a kick out of listening to  and remembering a time when life was simpler.

And as I listen to this stuff I am reminded that back then it seemed like time stood still,  that I could never have imagined this far into the future, or that I would actually live as longas I have.

I was in my twenties, everyone who was ever important to me was still alive and I was taking for granted the belief that they always would be.

Thinking of people in their forties as old,  that my kids would always be kids and that I could bluff my way through one radio station to another, break some rules along the way and chase dreams at a casual pace.

Time can really be a bastard.

Thankfully I preserved enough of the era by stopping to thread a tape and remembering to take it with me when I left the station.

Those voices I heard this morning are older now, and in all likelihood feel a little like I do.

Wondering where the time went, where our colleagues from that time ended up or how many of them are no longer on the planet.

Throughout this journal I have written about many friends who no longer are.

Keeping the tapes was one of the better decisions I made.

An opportunity to revisit my youth and to step away  for a few minutes from the ravages that have come with growing old. 

What I wouldn't give to be able to feel twenty-something again, if only for a few minutes.

More hair, a tighter and more nimble body and a bigger penis.

At least I think it was bigger.  

Old recordings of my own radio shows sound like it might have been.  imjustrick@aol.com

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