In a couple weeks I will be speaking at an “80’s and older group” at the Clinton High School All School Reunion. I have never spoken to a group with the audience clustered in their 80’s and 90’s before. Heck, there may even be a centenarian or two in the crowd!
I’m a little concerned because the closest I’ve come to such an experience is singing to people in our local nursing home. I’ve never had much luck cracking a joke with those folks because my humor seems to fly right over their heads. That makes me nervous because Paulette who contacted me said “you must reminisce and be funny”.
I also need to include my writing experiences in the talk. How can I talk about rejection letters, and lots of them, in a jovial manner? This I can see will take some careful thinking. 🙂
In my preliminary planning I’ve decided to describe my middle school years (long before that concept technically existed) because that’s when I first realized I wanted to be a writer. As my thoughts wandered back to those days a name popped into my head that I hadn’t thought about for many years…..Dick Biondi.
In the early 60’s the radio station WLS in Chicago would turn up their power at 10:00 pm. Ordinarily we could not get the station during the day but once the power was increased we were able to tune in the station on our home radio. They played Rock and Roll music and featured this crazy announcer named Dick Biondi.
As sit here I can picture our old farm house living room back in l960 . My brother Tom who was a year my senior was a true rock and roller. He never seemed to have any homework so after chores were done, supper was finished and dishes washed and put away our rock and roll evening began.
Tom kind of looked like Elvis. He had long black hair slicked back into a duck tail and held in place with gobs of Brylcreem. He spent the night in the same chair staring off into space as his favorite rock and roll music filled the house.
It drove our Mother crazy but then so did Elvis’s swiveling hips! Teenagers were difficult to raise back then too. 🙂
Meanwhile back to Mr. Biondi. He was a crazy man. In between songs he screamed and hollered. Seldom did he talk in a normal voice. When I googled him I found out he had been fired 23 times in his career. Bad behavior and telling rotten jokes seemed to be his big downfall.
Jerry my brother a year younger than me shared the same likes for his Pizza song that he would begin singing at a moments notice. Every night we waited anxiously for his Pizza song.
Pizza was an unknown food to us western Minnesota farm boys. It hadn’t reached the farm country grocery stores yet. In fact I had my first pizza when I was going to college when several of us got together at a young ladies apartment and learned how to make pizza from a box.
Remember the dough had to be mixed and time was required for the dough to rise. Ahh, where was Pizza Ranch when you needed it! 🙂
We were never satisfied to go to bed until Dick Biondi burst into song. The song was to the tune of that old campfire song, ‘On Top Of Old Smokey’ and it went like this:(sing along as you read this! :)) “On top of a pizza all covered with cheese, I saw my first meatball till somebody sneezed. It rolled off the table and onto the floor. It r0-0-0-0led right out of the door. It rolled into the street and there it was smashed and now my poor meat ball was a pile of hash!”
Jerry and I sang along with Mr. Biondi’s horrific voice and laughed and laughed once the song was done.
Now I idolized Dick Biondi because he was a crazy, enjoyable entertainer. I assumed my brother, Jerry, felt the same way. It wasn’t till years later that I discovered we adored the guy for two very different reasons.
At a family gathering years ago now we brought up the rock and roll radio announcer and shared memories of those living room radio concerts. I explained how I dreamed of becoming an entertainer like Biondi. I would sing the pizza song and make up a few more to go along with it. 🙂
Jerry snorted, “Heck, I didn’t have any aspirations of being an entertainer. I dreamed of going to Chicago!”
Many years have passed since that crazy broadcaster hit the airwaves and as I look back I realize that the dreams he inspired in my brother and I all came to fruition.
Jerry did get to Chicago. He also lived in Minneapolis, Toronto, the state of Pennsylvania, Switzerland, England and he finally settled as a retired gentleman in the state of North Carolina. He still continues to travel. He’s thinks nothing of hopping on a plane to travel anywhere in the world. His dream initiated on that old living room rug listening to rock and roll music interspersed with a wise-cracking Dick Biondi came true.
What about my entertaining dreams? I think I already have a blog where I describe some of my entertaining experiences and there have been many. After all a teacher has to be a little bit of an entertainer and I spent 42 years doing just that.
Nothing felt better to my soul than to have a class of students smile, giggle and laugh at something I said or did in the classroom even if I was sometimes the butt of the joke. Entertainment in the classroom made learning more enjoyable for the students as well as the teacher and aids.
Hopefully I’m entertaining you right now as you read this blog. My seven books have provided children of all ages entertainment and maybe even a few adults.:)
Even this past spring graduation period instead of buying those “ho-hum” graduation cards from the Dollar Store I wrote a poem to each of the graduates tailored to whom they were. Not poet-laureate quality poems but hopefully entertaining.
Well, that about wraps up this blog. Thanks Mr. Biondi for the walk down memory lane and for the inspiration you gave Jerry and I to guide us in experiencing the lives we did.
Who knows where Jerry may be flying off to? All I know is I have to get an ‘entertaining’ presentation ready for the aged. (Actually I’m approaching that same aged status myself!)
Maybe I’ll google Mr. Biondi singing the “Pizza Song”. That should inspire me. 🙂
Until next time.
