Stories From Maybe Boomer: Compassion, and Befriending “It! The Terror From Beyond Space”

Paul and I perused the channels on my family’s ultra-modern new television set hoping to find a great color show. Zippo. Every progarm was in black and white. I wanted to impress Paul, my new companion, and so far, the Quasar – Motorola’s beautiful twenty-four inch console set – was letting me down.

Things changed at precisely two o’clock.

“Oh, wait, flip back. Flip back,” Paul said.

I cranked the Motorola’s spiffy all-metal dial back one click to the opening credits of a movie.

“It, the Terror From Beyond Space! This could be cool,” I said.

“Look, look how clear the title is,” Paul replied. “You’d never be able to see that on your old Silvertone set.”

So blown away by crisp picture quality, we’d forgotten the fact the movie was in black and white. We didn’t care. The alien creature creating havoc inside the spaceship’s darkly-lit hull devoured our attention. To us, this standard 50’s sci-fi flick was a classic.

Halfway through It, I cried out, “Look at the scales on the monster’s skin!”

“And look! Look! There’s a zipper!”

“What?”

“On his back …”

“It’s really a rubber suit …”

“It can’t be …”

“It’s a rubber suit!”

“It’s so fake …”

“And look, now he’s picking some guy up …”

“And twirling him around …”

“Like he’s gonna heave him …”

“But it’s so fake …”

“Just showing their shadows …”

“I know …”

“Instead of them …”

“I know …”

“So the zipper doesn’t show …”

“I know …”

“I hate that …”

“I know.”

“I hate that.”

“Me, too.”

However, It got clobbered in the end. But what a bad finale that was. The monster was our hero. How could the American astronauts, dressed in hokey space suits, zap It before he reached the ship’s cheesy-looking control room to eat everyone in sight? I was so let down.

After Paul went home, sudden pangs of nostalgia came over me for the Silvertone set my family had owned forever. It sat in the corner of the basement now, unplugged, abandoned, collecting dust. The beautiful, ash-colored television had once been the family’s universe, producing a relentless drone close to sixteen hours a day. Occasionally, Dad had spoken over the Silvertone in anger when its fifteen inch screen shrank to eleven by nine after the horizontal and vertical holds got their way with things. With the all-encompassing love for our new Motorola, I knew the Silvertone’s worn-out tubes and technology would be hauled away soon.

Sure enough, a few weeks later, the set was gone. Both the Silvertone and It had been beaten by technology. Just as the creature was left alone to decay on Mars’ barren landscape, I imagined the frightening sight of my cathode comrade dumped in a landfill somewhere, disrespected, with no funeral service conducted or head stone prepared. I’d have appreciated its ashes being put into a nice urn, or a Kool Aid pitcher if we couldn’t afford the urn, or at least sprinkled around the Quasar as a respectful remembrance. I would miss my companion terribly. After all, before Paul, the Silvertone was the best friend I had.

This is an excerpt from my memoir, Maybe Boomer. The post honors the fifty-seventh anniversary of It! The Terror From Beyond Space and its August, 1958 debut.  Note: the film takes place in the “far off future” – 1973!

March Badness

It was March, 1963. I missed my old school from last year. I longed to have friends like the ones I had there. My new school experience at Oakview Elementary in Silver Spring, Maryland, was one big bore. Tedium. Rote drills. So many things, over and over again. Even air raid drills.

Curled up in a ball under my tiny wooden desk, I wrapped my arms tightly around my knees and bowed head. All I could think was – hadn’t World War II ended twenty years ago? Was sitting under this desk going to save me from our school roof falling down, let alone an H-bomb that landed on the cafeteria? Scarier still was coming face-to-face with sharp, petrified boogers down here, ones that dated back to World War I students.  If that wasn’t scary enough, what about the words, “Hitler was here,” and “Burn this school,” scratched on the underside of my desk?

Suddenly, my teacher said, “All right, children. Get up, now. The drill is over.”

Oh, no. Reading hour was next. Remember the exciting day back in early October when reading period was cancelled? Just to watch TV? That day had such potential.

It was a cloudy morning when a hundred students assembled on Mrs. Clark’s classroom floor, all eyes locked on the RCA Victor TV set showing Mercury Atlas 8 standing straight up against a clear Cape Canaveral sky. I sat cross-legged on the hard linoleum tile, my body forced between other kids’ legs and torsos. The position grew increasingly uncomfortable because the launch went through several delays. Even teachers began to whisper. “What’s taking so long?” “Do you think the rocket’s having technical difficulties?” 

Then the TV screen began to flutter. The picture turned snowy. The horizontal hold went wild.

An assistant librarian rushed to the scene to fix the ever up-scrolling picture. It looked like Mercury Atlas 8 had already blasted off six hundred times. Frustrated teachers fidgeted with foil-wrapped rabbit ears and various loose wires behind the set, all to no avail. If world-famous RCA Victor couldn’t keep its own horizontal hold under control, how was America to keep China from dropping the big one on our cafeteria, let alone Washington DC, worse yet Disneyland?

Out of nowhere, the TV announcer proclaimed the mammoth rocket had taken to the air. Everyone in the class rose to their feet and cheered the incredible news, even though no one actually saw the rocket go anywhere.

Eh. I wasn’t as impressed. Just not the same without seeing it. What a letdown. Even October had been boring. 

I missed my old school. I missed their horizontal hold, their TV sets, and my friends, the few that I had. I could think of nothing else. It was as though I was frozen here, locked in time forever, never to escape the worst month of all – March.

This was an excerpt from my memoir, Maybe Boomer. Read more there about my nostalgic look back at the 60s and the Baby Boom generation.

Remember This? Geritol TV Ads (and a very special “mystery person” – or two)

Hey, wait a minute.

Although the old black and white Geritol ads have long since left the airwaves (an ad highlighted below), this month’s “mystery person” is still very much around television. From the clues below, try to name this iconic television performer who:

*  became the oldest person to guest-host Saturday Night Live, a performance which was critically acclaimed and a major ratings success
*  has hosted an NBC practical-joke show that resulted in three consecutive Emmy nominations
*  has received three American Comedy Awards, three Screen Actors Guild Awards, four Golden Globes nominations, a BAFTA, a Grammy, and 23 Emmy nominations with six wins
* has a Guinness World Record for the longest television career for a female entertainer
*  is regarded as a pioneer of American television for being one of the first women to have creative control in front of and behind the camera
* holds the record for longest span between Emmy nominations for performances—her first was in 1951 and her most recent was in 2011, a span of 60 years—and has become the oldest nominee overall as of 2014
* is the oldest winner of a competitive Grammy Award, which she won at age 90 for her seventh book If You ASK Me (And of Course You Won’t)
* has been awarded American Comedy Awards, the Screen Actors Guild, the Television Critics Association and the British Academy of Film and Television Arts for her lifetime achievement awards, recognizing her contribution to television

By now you know who it is – Betty White, perhaps best known for her role as Rose on The Golden Girls sitcom. At 92 years young, she’s one of the world’s most amazing and vibrant entertainers, and is still active today.

So, what’s been Betty’s secret to success and longevity all these years?

 

 

That was Betty White in 1954. Somehow I doubt Betty White ever had iron poor blood.

But wait. “Feeling tired, run down…” “Just a tablespoon…” “And it’s good tasting…” Hm-m-m.

Is it possible Betty inspired another female performer to create this timeless skit?

 

 

TV. The Gift That Keeps on Giving. Even at 91.

A close friend of mine recently lost her husband. He was 91, and she’s 91. Imagine living over six decades with one person. That’s six decades of set routines – suddenly gone.

I want to help her with the big transition period ahead. One change will be her taking over the responsibilities he held in their relationship. For whatever reasons, he paid the bills and did the grocery shopping. Now she has to do them. Picture yourself being 91 and suddenly having crucial things to do you’ve rarely, if ever, done.

Apparently, another thing her husband did was take full responsibility of the TV and the remote control unit (maybe not surprising, but unfortunate).

As I sat in front of the TV set with her, she looked overwhelmed, confused about what the 53 buttons on the remote did. Apparently, her husband never showed her.

“All I know is he watched channel 4, 7 and 13,” she said.

I scrolled quickly through the channels. “Did you know you have 120 channels on your cable subscription?”

“I do?”

“Yes.”

“What on Earth is on all those channels? Why are there so many?” (Good question, but I withheld commentary).

“Let’s find out.” (Of course, I already knew most of the channels by heart, but sensed this could be a lot of fun hopping on board her TV excitement bandwagon. Ten years ago, my new and modern TV experience had been sheer ecstasy.)

“Well, did you know Channel 35 is twenty-four hours of weather?”

“Oh – how wonderful. I’ll always want to watch that.”

“But there’s more. Channels 39 through 43 – all movies.”

“You’re kidding. I never knew we had movies on our set.”

“Do you like animals?”

“There’s an animal station?”

“Animal Planet.”

“Oh, oh, let me write that down right … what number is it?”

“Fifty-eight.”

But when she heard about The Country Music Channel, she nearly danced in her recliner.

At one time not long ago, there were only a few channels to watch. Then, with cable, everybody went ga-ga over the gazillions from which one could choose. But, over the years, we all became disappointed and annoyed how little good quality programming existed on those channels.

May my friend live many more happy days exploring some of the pleasures missed that we’ve experienced – even taken for granted – for years.

And to spouses of all ages – get on the ball – and spread the joy around.