A close call and then the Creation
The Column: 01.08.24
I walked into the neighborhood bank the other day and there in the lobby, loading the ATM machines, were two guys with fistfuls of money, bricks of $100s, $50s $20s, a sight I’d never seen before, perhaps a signal from alternative reality that my chance at bank robbery was here, but then I saw the third man, his hand on the pistol in his holster, and so instead I walked up to the cashier’s window and asked for a couple grand so I can make New Year’s gifts to doormen at our building and Mitch the plumber and our cleaning lady and also to some deserving children.
I know it’s pitifully small-minded of me but I enjoy walking around with a $100 bill in my pocket. It’s a token of good luck. A silver dollar used to be a token but luck has undergone inflation. I’m old enough to remember when I picked radishes at Schreiber’s truck farm for a nickel a bunch, I remember it whenever I eat a radish. I was a dishwasher for $1.35/hour and a parking lot attendant for slightly more. In 1969, I sold a small humorous piece of writing to a magazine and got $500 for it and that settled me on a writing career. It wasn’t a matter of talent; it was about money. I chose radio because I could write for it and it paid better than radishes.
I married up, which is a good idea for a man, and when I came home from the bank my wife was very excited about the Webb telescope out in space sending pictures back to earth of celestial bodies millions of light years old, stars in the process of creation, that sort of thing, and it was very uplifting to hear her excitement about this marvel, even though it’s made her dubious about Creationism, which troubles me as an Episcopalian, but she was absolutely breathless with wonder at the advance of science, not realizing she was married to a potential bank robber.
I’m sorry if gay men miss out on the uplifting influence of the superior gender. Men, even in the 21st century, are still corrupted by our centuries as slavers, tyrants, despoilers, mobsters, monsters, and miscreants, whereas women, deprived of the opportunity to do evil, have pursued purity of heart and high standards.
This is true of my beloved and also of my women friends and colleagues. In my performing career, I sing duets with a woman friend, and once, backstage, about to go onstage and sing the Louvin Brothers’ “If I Could Only Win Your Love,” she pointed to my cheek and handed me a hanky and I looked in a mirror and there was some of my supper on my cheek, which I wiped off and we went out and sang.
Some men in the audience, envious of the glamorous company I keep, would’ve loved to see some corn kernels and a smear of meatloaf on my face, but the women only wanted to hear the song, which, forgive me for saying this, makes so much more sense sung by Heather and me than by Ira and Charlie Louvin. Two brothers shouldn’t need to win each other’s love, and most of the brother duets ran into serious problems, Don and Phil, the Wilson Brothers of the Beach Boys, and so on.
Men without women are in trouble and they know it. If Rudy had had a wife in 2020, he wouldn’t have given the press conference at Four Seasons Total Landscaping with hair dye running down his cheeks and told the big lie about the election, which led him down the slippery slope toward his defeat in court and bankruptcy and who knows what lies ahead. A wife would’ve said, “Wrong Four Seasons, sweetie, and go wash your hair.” If Melania had checked her husband’s speech, she would’ve said, “Skip the part about vermin poisoning our bloodstream. It’s creepy and weird.”
The chunks of hundreds and fifties were within easy reach, but I didn’t yield to impulse, I came home and listened to the woman I live with express wonder at the infinitude of the Creation, and instead of doing ten to twenty for grand larceny, I get to have lunch with her. This is a good way to start the New Year.
No more long shots, stick with what you know to be true, be glad for the Ben Franklin in my pocket. I am prepared to be lucky.
We’ve got two exciting offerings coming your way:
- A Prairie Home Companion is returning to the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota, on July 13!
The show will feature Garrison Keillor with special guests, including Heather Masse, Christine DiGiallonardo, Richard Dworsky, and the Royal Academy of Radio Actors (Sue Scott, Tim Russell, & Fred Newman).
SUBSTACK SUBSCRIBER PRE-SALE: Tuesday, January 9th, 10:00 a.m.
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GENERAL ON-SALE: Tuesday, January 16th, 10:00 a.m.
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- Also, there will be a live stream of A Prairie Home Companion from the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville at 8:30 p.m. ET on Jan. 11.
CLICK HERE to buy tickets to watch!
What's truly creepy and weird is that some people who consider themselves patriots will support a political party whose leaders talk about vermin poisoning the blood of our country and claim that any election they lost or lose was or will have been fraudulent. To them, elections are only valid if they win, and that's a sure sign of totalitarianism in the making should they ever succeed. Only sustained losses at the polls along with enforcement of our laws can bring such a party back to health and reality.
Once, in a quest for riches, Patti Fisher and I signed up to pick strawberries for fifty cents a flat. Easy picking as far as we could tell. Our mothers dropped us off, we were each given a flat, and we marched into the field with great determination and purpose. We bent over and started picking, finding out soon enough that it was not easy work. The stems were prickly and our backs started to get sore. We were hungry after a short while so for every strawberry picked, two went in our mouths. We ended up cranky and fratching with one another, and before you know it, we were throwing them at each other. Our shirts were solid strawberry red, as well as our hands and faces. Our mothers must have known exactly what would happen given our dashed expectations, and they were sitting in their cars waiting for us. They didn’t say anything. Patti and I didn’t even say goodbye. That night, I threw up strawberries for the good part an hour.
With money comes work (unless you’re a bank robber, in which case the effort to plan is involved) and for those of us who do work hard for it, it’s earned and rewarding. Even if it won’t pay all the bills. I can’t afford to take a couple of grand out to tip all the people who do service for me, I wish I could, but I tip generously and I always thank people who do something for me. I definitely tip the postman twice a year because he happily takes my outgoing mail in the dead heat of summer and the freezing winter.
And I too keep a hundred dollar bill in my wallet because it gives me some sense of security for some reason.
I know one thing. I hate strawberries.