public radio and me

OK so as far back as I can remember...or atleast since my family returned to the states in '93...family car trips meant two things: my brother and I fighting over the arm rest, and public radio.



Ten years later, I've gotten over the arm rest thing, for the most part. Despite its convenient placement for a road-weary head (when pulled out slightly upright) or just a practical wall between you and the Scum of the Earth As You Know It (one's younger brother), I can actually say with confidence that I'm at peace with arm rests.
But if you know me, I'm far far away from being, in any sort of way, over public radio.
As of today, this 23rd day of January 2006 A.D., my career in public radio officially begins at KQED, Inc.

I can't really describe--especially on this silly blog--how good this feels. To be dramatic, I feel like I've been working my entire life for this to happen. Let me explain...

It all started, as I said, on family car trips. My parents would constantly scan the air waves for the local NPR station--easy to find on the lower half of the dial and marked by boring classical music and interrupted by the even-more-boring news.
I would literally stare out the window, envious of roadkill, and complain that "we already heard this."

I don't really know when it was that I realized I had it better than the roadkill and that this "NPR" stuff was actually interesting, but I did.
Throughout high school, I found an outlet for my explanatory tendencies (at one point, I had a very bad 'explaining habit') and love for putting stories together, at Herd TV--Carlisle HS's weekly student-run, school district news program. While most of my classmates were in Herd TV for the freedom (we were able to leave school to 'go out on assignment'--which usually meant going to Sheetz for a Schmuffinz or Rita's for a Mist-O shake), I was there for the thrill of the deadline!
The late-breaking news about Lamberton's MS's latest art project!
The intriguing way in which Cumberland County ran its waste-water treatment plant!
And Mooreland Elementary School's steel-drum concert!
Whoa!

In college I was a news slut, majoring in BJ. While we learned the 'commercial' way of doing news, I was the dork asking my professors if I could please do a 5-minute piece on gay adoption.
Please?
OK.
And while most of my classmates thought of Radio News Reporting (RTN345) as an annoying step toward our year of TV, I briefly mourned the passing from audio to video.
I say briefly because, quite frankly, who doesn't want to be on camera every week? But I knew in my heart that was all just fun and games and that the real stuff of life can be collected by microphone only.

This isn't to say I hold any disdain for TV peeps, nor my commercial news-minded counterparts; in the end, it's all part of the same waxey ball.
I guess it's just that I prefer ear wax.


So now, more than two years later, it's finally happened and it feels pretty cool.




This one might take a little longer than the arm rest thing.