A Rant In Reverse

In a departure from the usual post on Inspirational music, today I’d like to tell you about a kid I just met.

Kids!
I don’t know what’s wrong with these kids today!
Kids!
Who can understand anything they say?
Kids!
They are disobedient, disrespectful oafs!
Noisy, crazy, dirty, lazy, loafers!
While we’re on the subject:
Kids!
You can talk and talk till your face is blue!
Kids!
But they still just do what they want to do!
Why can’t they be like we were,
Perfect in every way?
What’s the matter with kids today?

From Bye Bye Birdie by Charles Strouse and Lee Adams

I needed a sound system for our up-and-coming WFM Listening Room House Concerts and suddenly remembered that for the last 5 years I had a great one sitting in storage out in Colorado last used when the Missus and I had a house and recording studio out there.

The problem was, how to get it from Colorado to NYC.  A trip out there was impossible both time-wise and financially.  I’d have to get somebody to go into that unopened-for-the-last-5-years storage room, pack it all up and send it to me.  Not the most fun or rewarding job on the planet.  On top of that, I needed it fast.

I called my old cowboy buddy, Tom Flower, who happens to be not only a genuine cowboy, but also a high school teacher.  I couldn’t ask him to do it.  He’d feel obliged to do it for nothing and I wouldn’t ask my worst enemy (if I had one) to do this job – especially for free.

I thought he might know a responsible kid at school who might want to pick up a few extra bucks.  Trouble was, this is a very expensive Genelec studio system that would need to be packed up just right and handled with ultimate professional care.

So the thought of some kid (see above lyric) who I didn’t even know tackling this job with any authority made me wince every time I thought of it.  The above song has played through my mind several times over the past two weeks.

On top of that, I needed someone who could go into this unopened store-room, weed through all our stuff, find everything including all the right cabling, and care for it like I would.

Probably an impossible task, all things considered.

Tom gave me the number of one JT Gilmore of Westcliffe Colorado.  When we first talked by phone I found JT to be quite the kid.  Trouble was, though our conversation was peppered with “Yes Sirs” and “No Sirs”, a seemingly forgotten mannerism these days, JT was extremely busy and getting ready to leave for college within the week.  Yikes!

But I had no choice.  I was committed to this particular sound system and took a deep breath and said to JT, “If you want the job, you got it.”  He never asked about money and when I took another deep breath and told him I could only pay him $15 per hour, his response was, “Wow, thanks, Mr. Link.”

My worries somewhat alleviated, I then gave him the details of the job, told him that I would, on top of it all, be on a week-long business trip and not be reachable.  He’d have to get this all together and really pull through for me all on his own.

The day came when he entered the storage room for the first time, me on the cell phone talking him through the procedure of finding it all.  In the course of the half hour spent he also came across several large boxes of my precious 35mm slides from many of my past Broadway shows.  I decided with a gulp that he should pack those up also and send them off as well.

Now as well as sending a sound system worth a small fortune across the country, he was also packing and sending a couple of crates of precious memories.

But I had no time and neither did JT.  We were both leaving in 2 days.  I hung up the phone, mumbled a few words of prayer to the unknown god of Fedex and moved on in life.

Yesterday I got home from my business trip having completely forgotten about JT and his adventures only to find 5 huge boxes perfectly packed, taped up far beyond the necessary and beautifully delivered waiting in my hallway.

I dove in wondering what condition I would find things.

As the song says, “Perfect in every way…”

Though I had forgotten to ask him, he had even thought to include the slide projector along with the slides.  This way I might even be able to view them!

All was in perfect condition, perfectly packed, in perfect order.  A job extremely well done.

Was I surprised?  Not after getting to know this fine young man.

Kids!  Faith restored!

For more inspirational music, thoughts and ideas from Peter Link,
please visit Watchfire Music.