Life, actually…

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REEL LIFE IN THE 1950s

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The shiny new Silvertone reel to reel tape recorder hums idling in my darkened childhood bedroom. I am preparing to audio-record a radio show, and it is two minutes till air time.

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The time is 1959, when my world is still young and ladened with hope.

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I just purchased this metallic time machine, agreeing to make monthly payments till all debt is settled. My fevered dreams are invested in the craft of making time repeat itself at my leisure.

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The needle volume gauge awaits the push of a button. The motor rumbles and vibrates. The pristine rheostat knobs beg at the starting gate.

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And now, the radio station ID spoken, the daily comedy show begins and the reels start spinning. The left-hand reel moves counter-clockwise, feeding a brown plastic ribbon past magnetized cubes, the right hand reel neatly spools the now-recorded sound.

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Within minutes I will have my own repeatable archived recording of the Bob and Ray Presents the CBS Radio Network show.

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Once I’ve pressed the STOP button, I push REWIND and watch the left-hand reel re-claim the fresh recording.

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Later tonight, just before sleepville, I will re-load the program, push PLAY and slowly fall asleep grinning to the improvised shenanigans of the two funniest comedians of my lifetime.

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How could life feel any more satisfying than it feels right now?

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This is as good as it gets, at least for this crystal-clear one-of-a-kind moment in time

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

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WEBSITE

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Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Life, actually…

WHEN BIPPY AND BEEPER RULED

“Beep me.”

“Page me.”

“Call my pager.”

“Here’s my beeper number.”

“Uh, where’s the charger?”

If you remember all these phrases and thoughts, you are getting on up in age. Looking back, it is difficult to understand how beepers were a real Thing for a time.

Much ado about mostly nothing.

The concept of non-emergency crises seems to have been invented just in time for paging, right before we learned to spend our waking hours on inconsequential matters via thumb-poked phone.

Yes, Children of the 21st. Back before and during my time, there were no cellphones.

We did have other ways to communicate, each of which came and went as fashion swayed to and fro.

There were walkie-talkies and two-way radios and telephones and telegrams and semaphores and smoke signals and megaphones and tin cans joined by string…

And voice to voice hosepipes and postcards and letters.

There was sky writing, there was the Pony Express, there were letter carriers, there were pigeons and couriers and, and…well, there were plenty of ways to communicate, plenty of ways to annoy someone.

Great inventions all.

But progress often accompanies regress.

With any communications advance comes the opportunity to relay useless and irritating messages.

Then came beepers, a 1970s fashion accessory, invented right before hand-toted electronics conquered the world.

Invented at the same time but in parallel societies was the bippy.

The bippy was a verbal device designed to make you giggle. Used only by comedians and wisecrackers, bippy had no meaning at all. Later, made-up  words like yahoo and google were inspired by bippy.

Silly and meaningless and unforgettable.

Back then, during bippy and beeper times, every executive or entrepreneur or professional just had to possess a beeper. Clipped to belt or purse or pocket, peeping out from a holster, hiding deep within an inside pocket, there lurked a beeper, a pager, or whatever else they were called.

When your beeper “went off” or paged you, you were required to grab a nearby phone and “call the office” or “call home” to see what the urgency was.

This made you feel connected, important, superior.

Whatever happened to all those beepers that are now cast aside?

For that matter, whatever happened to bippies and bippy jokes?

Bippy jokes made us chuckle even when we were not feeling so chuckly.

I’d like to spend just five minutes one day, once more contemplating my bippy and responding to my beeper. Five minutes would be about all I could tolerate.

You can bet your sweet bippy, er, beeper, it would be harmless fun.

And harmless, non-judgmental, non-shaming fun is exactly what I could use a bit more of.

Pardon my grammar. My beeper just went off and my bippy made me do it

(c) 2021 A.D. by Jim Reed

Catch Jim’s podcast:

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jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim’s 4-minute podcast: https://youtu.be/2G32pLL3Kqo

or read his transcript below:

Life, actually…

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MY ’54 CHEVY OIL GUZZLER AND I GO EXPLORING

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I am now time-travelled back to the days before interstate highways were a thing. I struggle to legally-park the green machine—my very first car, a rusty 1954 Chevrolet.

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Today, I get lucky. It only takes six forward-reverse maneuvers to land between designated white lines. I creak open the driver’s door and check to make sure adjacent vehicles are safely distanced from my precious cruiser.

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I enter the Jitney Junior—what you folks in the future will call a convenience store–and select enough snacks to last me through my upcoming journey.

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As I head down the winding blue road, I feel my independence beckoning. While inside this upholstered automatic-shift rattler, I am my own boss. I am king of my own little booth of privacy.

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The AM radio picks up a staticky signal, providing me with a private performance by Nat King Cole. The green machine and I politely stop to allow a rattling locomotive to pass by. A quick glance and a smiling wave are offered to the engineer. He returns the gesture.

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Once the earth stops rumbling, once the flashing red signals are dampened, once the coast is clear left and right, I push gas peddle, savor rail bumps, and begin the  journey.

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In the rearview mirror I see plumes of blue-gray smoke as acceleration occurs. In the trunk are unopened cans of motor oil. I use several quarts a week, not to mention the required gallons of gas. A just-in-case empty gasoline can shudders next to the oil containers. An oily rag rests atop them, useful when frequent fluid checks are needed.

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Eventually, I pass city limits signs and arrive in the village of Moundville. The state park is my destination. While it is only a short distance from home, it is a great distance from civilization.

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Moundville is the quietist place. Very few people travel here among the enormous mounds constructed by long-gone Native Americans. The quietness is appropriate. The quietness is homage to the thriving village that used to be here. Beautiful green grass covers the mounds. Silence hovers, forcing introspection and meditation.

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I drive through the enormous area, then enter the museum that displays instructive artifacts and exhibits that remind those of us living that there were once earlier families and tribes going about their daily lives.

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Since childhood, my infrequent visits to Moundville have infused my imagination with the idea that others came and went before me. And that I, too, have arrived and will eventually be replaced by future others who in turn will live their lives…

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My sobering moments completed, I am now ready to check the oil, test the faulty gas gauge, dispose of cellophane wrappings that once housed nibbles, brush away the crumbs, and head back to my tribe.

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As I pass shops and eateries and service stations and asbestos-shingled bungalows and dusty side roads, I ponder a bit about things like small temporary villages, passing behaviors, gossamer lives, love and life and death, passion and listlessness, moral high and low grounds…you know, things that are unsolvable but must be mentally massaged once in a while.

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I think about the joys and terrors that I may experience in the coming decades of life on earth. I struggle to write these feeling and observations down so that each moment will mean much more than just another day, just another life.

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I am destined to be a writer and recorder. I just don’t know it yet

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

*.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Hear Jim’s podcast on youtube:  https://youtu.be/ipW_Ks6M0tQ

Life, actually…

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COMINGS AND GOINGS IN THE DEEP SOUTH

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Unfettered thermometers exceed the 90 mark on this gloriously brilliant sunshine day.

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A covered-dish family reunion is taking shape in the foothills of Appalachia, and I am here to bask.

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Relatives I haven’t seen in years exit the heat. They suddenly glory in the air conditioned environment of an immaculate countryside building where communion and comradeship are taking place.

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Kinfolk I can’t name mingle with longtime familiar faces. As each family lays out victuals to share and compare, laughter and tears combine. People I can identify only by sight welcome me as one of this sweet tribe. People I know from childhood grin and comfort me as I pass among them. Hugs are offered and accepted.

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This reunion is a sharing of memory and expectation. Invisible ghosts of people no longer here, wend their way through the crowd as we share stories and anecdotes about them. We miss them, but we are happy that they no longer feel the pain and sadness of departure.

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We pay close attention to those of us still present and accounted for.

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We take our time listening and sympathizing. We talk and signify.

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The long table of gifted food is aswirl with homemade dishes, freshly plucked fruits and vegetables, carry-out goodies, thawed-out casseroles, steaming tasties and chilled crunchies and shockingly addictive desserts.

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We honor the toddlers and revere the nonagenarians and compare, always compare.

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This is our way of seeing live and in person the people we are slowly beginning to age like, our way of remembering how beautiful life felt when we were young and thankfully clueless.

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We are all having such a good experience being suspended in time that we don’t want to leave. And we re-experience the trademark of our tribe: the long, long goodbyes.

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Each farewell takes as much as an hour as we attempt to hold and fist-bump and shake hands without leaving anybody out.

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In memory, the long long goodbyes will have to last till this time next year, when once again we aim our vehicles toward the sacred gathering place where familiar souls commune

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

*.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Life, actually…

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AIRING OUT THE UNNOTICEABLES 

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Paying attention to the normally unnoticeable is my favorite pastime. It’s a way to avoid dealing with the harsher realities. It is deeply satisfying at times when nothing else is.

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Paying attention to the villages and villagers around me keeps me in touch with the textures of being alive.

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For instance:

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The Wandering Woman shows up everywhere I go. She is always on foot. She is forever on her way to someplace else. Her lanky, serious trek is all-consuming. I see her in the ‘burbs, in the town centers, in the in-between alleys and roadways. You can watch for her, too. She’s the woman whose scarf hides her hair, or the lack thereof.

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I pass by a brilliantly-red fire engine and the firefighters who make it sparkle. I wonder, Why is a fire station called a Fire Station? Why not Life-Endangering Conflagration Abolition Central or Department of De-Flamation or Fahrenheit 451 Control? Or even Douse That Fire Headquarters?

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I cruise the asphalted lanes piercing the villages. My wife asks, Why does the interstate highway sign read Downtown Exit? Why isn’t it called Entrance, since the turn lane leads into the City, not out of it?

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I espy the homemade signs, both mysterious and misleading. The best sign I ever saw: EARS PIERCED WHILE YOU WAIT. No kidding. Just two blocks from my shop.

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One thrift store has a large hand-lettered sign: DO NOT PLAY WITH TOYS. So…what else would they like for me to do with them? It would be more poetic to say: DO NOT TOY WITH TOYS.

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I just drove past an elevator service repair company, located in a one-story building. Think on this for a moment.

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A large metal sign at the Power Company instructs, “To provide faster service a bill stub will be required at the drive thru beginning January 1, 1997.” This means a lot if you’re still living in 1996.

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It’s 96 degrees outside. On the sidewalk a hot dog is eating a discarded hot dog.

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They say two plus two equal four. They never specify four what. Does this apply to everything?

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See what I mean? Paying attention to the unnoticeable takes my mind away from crises both real and feared. My paying attention gifts marginalized people with status they don’t even know they have.

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Paying attention makes me feel I am not wasting my time in these climes. Not everything has to be political, not every observation has to be a critique.

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Indeed, paying attention helps me look life and you in the eye. It keeps me in touch with the gentle beauty of all the firmament I am privileged to inhabit.

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Come join me in taking notes and paying homage to all that might otherwise be missed

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

*.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Catch Jim Reed’s Red Clay Diary podcast here: https://youtu.be/q3keoh8eUFc

or read his transcript below:

Life, actually…

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FIREWORKS GO BOOM BOOM

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In the muggy summer twilight heat of our Deep South village, you can feel excitement and anticipation rising in the heavy air.

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It’s another Fourth of July here. Like so many other Fourths of July, we are all peering out doors and windows to see who will join us in the streets for the annual fireworks display.

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Just above us on a ridge called Red Mountain, the world’s largest cast iron statue hovers on its pedestal, anvil and spear in place, ever prepared for whatever the Village offers.

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Visiting strangers mingle with locals, glancing and re-glancing at the sculpture as if the big show might be missed in a blink. Soon, above the head of this icon, there will be bursts and outbursts, booming loudness and applause, as the sky is illuminated one  second at a time.

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But right now, all is quiet except for gurgling babies and yippy dogs and laughing gossipers and nervous run-amok children.

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The impending show is free to all, so the price of admission is just right, for paupers and millionaires alike.

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As if the war-level volume isn’t enough, radios are turned up full blast with patriotic music, and expensive amateur explosives polka-dot the lawns.

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While all this is going on, I prepare myself for watching and observing all the goings-on. Once the crackling and earth-shaking begins, I will walk among the throngs and watch the watchers. Fireworks I have seen before. What I enjoy most is the expressions on people’s faces as they thrill to the show.

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All gaze upward from blankets spread and lawn chairs unfolded, from hoods of cars and open windows, from strollers and porches and truck beds and fence posts, from tree limbs and stalled scooters and frozen skateboards.

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Here it comes. The boom-boom crack-crack bang-bang swish-swish heaven-painting display of wartime munitions converted into jolly, peacetime entertainment.

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And here I go, watching confused babes and hunkered-down birds and camouflaged cats and hands-over-ears fretters, each a party to this strange and wonderful and dangerously enjoyable twenty-minute outburst.

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For these all-too-few moments, everybody forgets politics and tribe and beliefs and animosities. Everybody suddenly merges as one tribe to gaze in awe at the volcanic fire and smoke above.

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I watch as faces are transported into a never-for-long land of simple joy, simple enjoyment. I marvel at how we all get along during times like this. I marvel always at the fact that this feeling is not sustainable all the time.

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And, of course, I marvel at how in the not-too-distant, not-soon-enough future we will again find a way to harmoniously focus side-by-side on the simple act of being excited and satisfied with life as it is, life as it could be

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

*.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Catch Jim Reed’s Red Clay Diary podcast: https://youtu.be/aX6NQL-ZBu0

or read the transcript below:

Life, actually…

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ALIVE AND WELL IN NO MA’AM’S LAND

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I got two things from my Deep South upbringing: I learned to show respect for others, and I learned that, even when I did not feel respect, my manners would never allow that disrespect to show.

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This duality of behavior turned out to be pretty danged important as I wove my way through life. It still makes life more livable.

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When interacting with humans, it turns out that treating them with respect is usually pretty helpful. I’m at my best when I keep my mouth shut—it’s way too easy to make a snarky remark or a judgmental retort.

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So, at my best, on a good day when the clouds are primping and the birds are chortling,  I act gentlemanly.

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The first time I met attorney Brian Stevenson he had just said something that sounded Southern Manners-like, even though he is not from the South, “Each man is more than the worst thing he ever did.”

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I worked this around in my head and wondered why I could not stop pondering this statement—re-worked nowadays as “Each of us is more than the worst thing we ever did.”

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I walked up to him after his speech and asked, “That thing you said, is it original with you?” He said Yes. I asked whether I could quote him in the future and he smiled and said Yes again.

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So, for years I have applied Brian Stevenson’s statement to many aspects of my life. I use it to remind myself that people who behave badly, people with whom I disagree, must be more than that one thing that ticks me off.

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As I say, on a good day when dogs aren’t yapping and traffic drivers aren’t screaming and manipulators aren’t scheming, I can take one extra moment—maybe two extra moments—and examine the goodness that must be hiding within. The dog is happy when petted, the enraged driver is an otherwise kind parent, the schemer does volunteer work for the poor.

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Brian’s remark fits right in down here in the Deep South, where we are raised to say Yes Ma’am and No Ma’am, and Thank You, and Please, and After You, Sir.

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The funny thing about manners—if manners is what this story is all about—is that once you behave in a kindly fashion on a regular basis, you actually begin to Be more kindly. I don’t know why, but there is a kind of “Acting yourself into a new way of Being” thing going on here.

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There’s nothing magic about manners and diplomacy. They simply make for a more peaceful and cooperative environment.

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After all, when we get along better, Tums sales go down and celebratory toasts arise.

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Here’s to twenty-four hours filled with Thank You and Please and How Nice You Look Today

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

*.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Catch Jim Reed’s Red Clay Diary podcast on youtube: https://youtu.be/ywzfzxq_5wg

*.*.*.

or read the transcript below…

*.*.*.

Life, actually…

*.*.*.

DANCING AND DODGING IN VILLAGE STREETS

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I am an untrained dancer navigating the choreography of village streets.

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Just look around. There is movement and energy everywhere. Here’s what it feels like in the middle of the day in my own downtown neighborhood.

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A lunchtime employee hugs close her to-go carton.

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A disoriented visitor treads the sidewalk, trying to find out what’s where.

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One sidewalk leafblower-worker blasts leaves and trash over to other neighbors’ storefronts

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One large plane descends toward the airport, causing the earth to vibrate.

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An emergency helicopter heads for the medical center.

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A firetruck roars past and shakes the windows.

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Another dogwalker polices poop.

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Security guards change shifts and chat.

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A panhandler trolls for someone to listen.

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Pedestrian and child wait for the right light.

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Motorist after motorist turns the wrong way on one-way streets…free entertainment for street-level employees stationed in picture windows

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Dead-battery victim hopes for a jumpstart.

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Coat-hanger borrower attempts to unlock a car door.

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Choreographed drivers dodge and weave: motorcyclists, scooterists, bicyclists, muscle car-ers, mufflerless joyriders…

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High climbers swing through the air: lightbulb-changers, tower repairers, roofers, AC maintainers, pruners, sign installers, awning cleaners.

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Parking-meter police flash yellow signals and punish at random.

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A trash collector snaps open a fresh plastic bag.

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One homeless person picks for food through a garbage container.

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A lone server retrieves used napkins and cutlery from a sidewalk table.

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A mysterious manhole worker peeks out from beneath the asphalt.

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A letter carrier rushes to stay on time.

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Food deliverers white-rabbit from door to door.

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A freelance window cleaner looks for more work.

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A seasonal window slogan painter totes bucket and supplies.

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A meter to meter quarter collector trudges slowly, each coin increasing the pushcart weight.

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High-lamp installers/replacers lean forward atop cherry pickers.

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Orange cone distributors distribute orange cones, seemingly at random.

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Scooter and bike monitors station rental scooters and bikes here and there.

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A strutting tailored-suit-with-briefcase executive dodges his way through this fine mess.

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One police officer in the center lane directs drivers past bent fenders.

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A blue-shirted worker scrubs away the overnight graffiti.

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Delivery trucks block lanes everywhere, accelerating the dynamics of all this manic movement.

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And so on and so forth.

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You see what I mean? We are all pawns of an invisible choreographer, each dancing small steps of life, each attempting to do what needs to be done, each unaware of what the final performance will look like seen from afar.

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We just go on dancing the dance. The longer we do this the better the chance we have of producing a moment of gracefulness that hopefully will please the gods and entertain the pigeons

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

*.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Catch Jim’s podcast: https://youtu.be/A_BSHsIs4-M

 *.*.*.

or read his transcript below…

*.*.*.

Life, Actually…

*.*.*.

THE INVISIBLE SKY

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Lying on my back in a rickety pinchy folding deck chair, I can observe the nighttime sky and the twinkling heavens.

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There is nothing like this experience. I am face up gazing into the void and imagining what it would be like to stare skyward from atop a rotating planet mere light years from here. What it would be like to gaze at somebody like me from afar. Gazers gazing at one another.

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Back here in the 1950s I wonder whether in the future the skies will remain  so clear, so unobstructed. I imagine encroaching industry and indiscreet lights slowly occluding this cosmic view.

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Many decades from now I will be writing about this wonderful experience, hoping that you and I can compare notes about stargazing. Hoping that someone else besides me actually notices what’s going on Up There.

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By the 1990s I again have the privilege of looking up at the darkened skies and seeing a long-tailed comet hovering in clear view. The comet remains there night after night. Each day I ask most people I meet whether they are awed by this floating diamond. Each person admits to forgetting to look up. Each  promises to catch a glimpse of this imposing phenomenon.

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Next day after next day each person snaps fingers and confesses to once again missing the opportunity.

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Am I the only one making note of this remarkable visitor to our solar realms?

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I want to share and compare, but a million-mile comet does not seem to inspire the people I talk with.

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Back again to the 1950s I am recalling: I note and absorb this glorious moment, just me and the firmament, and hope against hope that I will never grow so old, so distracted, so pummeled by life, that I will forget a special time and place when I realized the skies and the skies realized me

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

 *.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY

Catch Jim’s podcast on youtube: https://youtu.be/NAUAVQICKUE

or read the transcript below:

Life, actually…

*.*.*.

A CHIP OFF THE OLD CROCK

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I’m standing at the kitchen sink munching a freshly-washed carrot.

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Directly before me at eye level is an old thick-glassed milk bottle someone tossed  a century-ago. Now it is retrieved, cleansed, shining at me. It is unchipped.

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Some of the wonderful old dishes and cups around here are chipped or cracked. They invite inspection and meditation.

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Each chip reveals something about itself if I will only do the research.

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A countertop blue and white patterned plate complete with quarter-inch notch belonged to my mother. I cannot discard it because it is part of family history. My family breakfasted, snacked, lunched, dined a thousand times on its surface.

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Back to childhood, where I stand before the primal kitchen sink some carefully-counted decades ago. Next to me Sister Barbara accepts a plate I just cleared from the dinner table, scrubs it, rinses off the suds, hands it over to Brother Ronny. Ronny dries and stacks it, preparing for the next dripping dish.

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We kids clear the dinnerware, wash and dry it, later put everything in its assigned place. It’s what we do after Dad has spent the day earning enough income to afford groceries, after Mother has prepared a very special meal of corn on the cob, cornbread, carrot sticks and other nibbles, and the best meat loaf ever consumed thus far in my brief life.

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If I accidentally chip a plate, Mother groans in pain, but nothing more is said. The plate is now a family member complete with boo-boo. No family member would be discarded because of such an imperfection, so the plate resumes its place until the next meal.

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Should a dish fall apart, its shards will be used later as part of garden decorations or pieced together to become an outdoor plant container. The family remains intact even after transfiguration.

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Many years later, as in Right Now, I look around.

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This is a chip day.

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Chip day is when I count and sort and examine chips and cracks. Each is a memory, each a lesson, each a representation of something that must be noted, must be noticed, must be notated.

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These chips remind me of special times when all the world around me felt exciting and secure and hopeful. Each flaw brings out the beauty of an object previously taken for granted.

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I find myself through the years feeling the urgency of life, the urgent need to notice, notice, notice, the compulsion to respect and draw meaning and wisdom from the flaws of a world I cannot control.

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As a child drinking hot chocolate from a chipped cup, I gaze into the fluid, amazed by its swirl, its remaining ring, its heft in my small hands. I rub my finger over the chip, memorizing the feeling. I examine the imprint on the skin after pressing the crack. I want this and every good moment to last forever.

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And at last, as a fully grown and mellow-aged adult, I feel so grateful that all the happenings in my life can be called forth at will, to be examined and cherished as beautiful cracks in an amazing firmament

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Jim Reed © 2021 A.D.

 *.*.*.

WEBSITE

*.*.*.

Weekly Podcast: REDCLAYDIARY