• Media

    Redemption at Breakfast

    April 1, 2001

    I was a little nervous approaching a breakfast meeting a few weeks ago my personal marketing guru, Al Ries. I’ve been reading books he wrote or co-authored since I discovered his classic, Positioning, about 15 years ago. His logic struck me so clearly that I have been pushing his later writings on employees and clients ever since.

    But I’ve been haunted by the fear that, subject to his scrutiny, my own record as publisher of these newspapers would get a failing grade. The purpose of breakfast was to discuss story ideas about Al, but I had a secondary motive. Having been raised a Catholic, I learned at an early age the import of going to church and confessing one’s sins to the priest. In return, the priest would give absolution and God would grant forgiveness. Now as an adult, I felt a strange desire to confess my marketing sins somewhere between the coffee and French Toast.

    The short version of his doctrine is: in a world in which we are bombarded by millions of messages, our brains only assign a space a couple of words long for each company or product we care to remember. Volkswagen means small. Mercedes means expensive. Maytag means washers. Xerox means copiers, etc. When products remain true to their narrow “branding,” they succeed. When they morph into other meanings, they fail. Xerox computers never made it. Neither did larger VWs or inexpensive Mercedes. In fact, these diversions hurt the image and earnings of the original brands.

    Try to be all things to all people and you will fail, Al preaches. The secret of success: narrow your focus – and thus enlarge your marketing potential.

    I used to work for the big daily newspapers. Then I instinctively followed his sermon when I quit and started my own neighborhood newspapers, focused on and even named after the zip code I live in, Atlanta 30306, and later, the one I grew up in, Atlanta 30305.

    Everything seemed to be going fine. Then we approached a dilemma: we needed to grow the company, but didn’t want to change its focus. We began to look at the potential business beyond our zip code boundaries and wondered if we wouldn’t do better if we enlarged our coverage – and changed our names. Temptation. Greed. Envy. This fork in the road had all the makings of a morality play.

    For months, my staff argued the merits and the risks of changing our original name and focus. Some thought it would show growth. Others argued it would confuse our original readers. In the end, it probably did both. Over time, we have proved that we could survive the metamorphosis, but would this youthful indiscretion forever hinder our marketing purity and potential? It has worried me ever since.

    After my first cup of coffee, as our discussion drifted toward neighborhoods, I broached the subject: “You know, my Atlanta Buckhead paper used to be called Atlanta 30305.”

    “Yes, I know,” he said dryly and changed the subject.

    “What was that?” I wondered. Disapproval? Disdain? Disinterest? I pressed again after the waitress cleared the dishes. I needed to know if my company was continuing to harvest fruit from a poisoned tree.

    “I’ve got to ask you, was it a mistake for my company to change its names as such an early age?” He paused, took a sip of tea and looked at a recent copy of my paper. “Here it comes,” I thought. “My penance is on the way. Would I spend my life in purgatory?” I suddenly noticed Al’s face reminded me of one of the priests from my grade school years. I braced for his answer. “Please, give me an answer,” I thought. “I can’t carry this burden any more.”

    “No,” he said. “I think you did the right thing.”

    “Come again?” I said in shock.

    “I think the zip code names were novel, but they don’t a lot to people who don’t live there. They don’t know where the zip begins or where it ends. Everyone knows where Buckhead is. The name connects to a place in people’s mind. Your product has weight just for carrying that brand.”

    “But what about Atlanta Intown or Atlanta North, my other papers?” I asked.

    “I don’t know enough about Atlanta to know if people use those terms,” he said. “But if people say I live ‘Intown’ or live ‘North’ then it works.”

    There it was: redemption. As we exchanged business cards in the parking lot, I felt a weight lift off my shoulders. “Could I email you if I have future marketing dilemmas?” I asked.

    “Sure,” he said.

    As I drove away, beaming, I thanked God for email, wishing for a moment that I could email Him for guidance on life’s more important dilemmas. Or at least share a breakfast. “Maybe one day,” I thought. “Right now, I’ve got to write a column.”

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  • Atlanta,  Life Stories

    Grade School Reunion

    March 1, 2001

    I’ve been speaking to civic groups in the past few months, retelling humorous stories from my early school days that first appeared in these columns. One in particular, about the day in fourth grade when my hamster accidentally got lost in the several-layered 1960s-nun-garments of Sister Susan Marie, seems to attract the most attention and laughs. Several times I’ve been accused of making up this story, so I was happy to get verification on a recent Saturday night.

    A year ago, a reader passed along to her son in California one of my columns about my grade school years. I had not seen Tom Gonter since 6th grade, but last spring he emailed me that he was moving back to Atlanta and proposed we organize a reunion of our grade school class at Christ the King on Peachtree Road.

    While high schools and colleges usually keep good records of alumni, we found that our early years existed mainly in our own minds and in the fragments of paper some of us have kept through the years. Our reunion effort began when five of us met for beers in Buckhead and played a game of sorts, writing out on two napkins the name of anyone who had been in our classes during the 1960s. As the list got longer, it took on the air of a Trivial Pursuit game with everyone giving a rousing cheer when a particularly obscure person was recalled. We then began an email campaign, slowing finding more than three dozen classmates through the Internet.

    In early February, we gathered at a condo clubroom across the street from school to excavate long-buried memories of learning from the often sweet but sometimes fierce order of nuns. Nancy Sterne brought her first-grade report card, reminding us how we were judged in our early years on subjects such as “is reverent at prayer” or “ keeps profitably busy.” For years, we had suspected Nancy was a straight-A student, but we found Bs and Cs scattered across her scores for “handwriting.” Mike Egan and I admitted to failing in handwriting in first grade. I recalled how the principal, the most feared of all the fearsome nuns, Sister Mary Timothy – or “Big Tim” as some dared to call her behind her back – suddenly would burst into our first grade class and check our work. Once she looked over my work in handwriting class, tore it up in front of everyone and yelled, “Chop Suey – your handwriting is nothing by Chop Suey!” (I’ve never been able to eat the stuff since.)

    Mark Murray drove in from Greensboro and announced to all that, had it not been for the tight reins of the nuns, he would not be the successful husband, father and businessman he is today. The secret, he recalled, was that when he got in trouble with the sisters at school, he would walk home that afternoon to find his mother and father waiting on the doorstep to administer follow-up punishment. Parental responsibility back then was not delegated to schools as it often is these days; it was a 24-hour partnership. In his adult years, Mark has visited several of our sisters, including meeting Sister Loretta Joseph at her school in Philadelphia. He told her students of how she kept him straight at an crucial time.

    As we left the reunion, we joked about how some things haven’t changed over the years. Despite our best efforts to keep this reunion top secret, the nuns heard about our plans for this mixer between the boys and the girls. They dispatched a proper chaperone, Sister Eileen, to monitor our fun for the entire five-hour party.

    There’s talk of meeting again soon and watching one of our classmates, Libby Whittemore, perform on stage at her Buckhead cabaret. Given we may have a nun secretly watching us, she’ll have to have a G-rated set.
    And though many classmates can now testify to the day my hamster ran amuck, before I give my next speech, I will be sure to scan the audience to see if any nuns have been sent to monitor my remarks. I just hope she doesn’t ask to see my handwritten notes!

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  • Life Stories,  Media

    Nothing But the Truth

    February 1, 2001

    When the notice for jury duty arrived, I thought perhaps I would escape as easily as I did a few years ago when a lawyer dismissed me – no doubt due to my years of being a courtroom reporter on several Southern newspapers.

    But this time, I was a prospect for a rape trial and the lawyers seemed to be concerned about other backgrounds. During voir dire, the process of meticulously interviewing each prospective juror, the prosecutor was most impressed with one man named Kevin Millwood. “Are you the same Kevin Millwood who pitched the one-hit game during last month’s playoffs for the Atlanta Braves?”

    “Yes, ma’am,” he answered politely.

    Photo: Kevin Millwood of the Atlanta BravesKevin_millwood

    The entire courtroom perked up. “Well, sir,” she continued. “I’ll have you know this is the first time in years that my husband has expressed any interest in coming to work with me.” Kevin made the final cut, as did I. So did a man named Perry Mason, who we later elected foreman. We now had a jury of nine men and three women. Before opening arguments, we were dismissed for lunch.

    As we walked down the hall, I envisioned a crowd running up to Kevin to get his autograph or to shake his hand. The tension was building as we silently walked past the courtroom doors. Suddenly I could hear footsteps running down the hall behind us, no doubt one of Kevin’s fans.

    “Sir, sir!” a man was calling. I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Mr. Schroder,” the man said to me. I turned around, surprised. “Yes,” I said to the young, well-dressed man. “I just wanted to say hello and tell you how much I enjoy your paper. I just graduated from law school and have to observe this trial. When I heard them call your name, I recognized it because I live in Peachtree Hills in Buckhead and have been reading your paper for years. I just want to tell you how glad I am that you all are doing well now. Keep up the good work.”

    I beamed all the way to lunch.

    Later, in the jury room, we all sat around reading the morning newspaper. Kevin’s name was on the front page as possibly being one of the players to be traded to Seattle for Ken Griffey Jr. Finally, someone asked Kevin about the possible trade. Another asked about the Yankees series, and we talked about the Mets. But no one had the guts to ask for an autograph.

    Finally, on our third day, a talkative woman, who had always sat next to Kevin and engaged him in conversation, began to talk about Christmas shopping. Kevin said he did most of his in the clubhouse when the Nike catalog guy came through. She said, “You keep mentioning the clubhouse, do you work there?” The room fell silent. Surely, she knew what we had been talking about for days.

    “Yes,” he said.

    “Is it a golf club? Are you a golfer?” We all laughed nervously.

    “No, ma’am. I play on the Atlanta Braves.”

    “Are you the pitcher?” she asked.

    “Yes, ma’am.”

    “Oh, well, then you have to give me your autograph.”

    Suddenly, everyone else started pulling out items they had been quietly storing: a baseball, a Braves cap, a ticket stub to a World Series game he pitched. Someone passed him a copy of our newspaper, which I had brought for the jurors to read. Then everyone started passing copies of our newspaper for him to sign, including me. He signed the front page of every one.

    In our business, we always hope people will hang on to our issues. Thanks to Kevin, I know that issue will be kept for a long time.

    Photo: Kevin Millwood when he was with the Atlanta Braves

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  • Atlanta,  Life Stories,  Media

    Meeting The Moviegoer

    January 1, 2001

    In 1977, I returned from my junior year at college and hurried to the funeral of my Great Aunt Bolling, I fell in with other latecomers behind the casket being wheeled down the aisle of the church. A distinguished gentleman was in front of me. He turned, caught my eye and nodded hello. He seemed somehow familiar. At the burial, my father introduced me to him: “Meet your cousin, Walker Percy.”
    I had heard Walker’s name spoken with reverence just a few months earlier by fellow English students at the University of Virginia. During literary sessions at my fraternity, passages from his novels had been read out loud, alongside excerpts from William Faulkner. But I had not yet joined the ranks of his devotees. I wasn’t even aware we were cousins. It turned out we were related by marriage, through the very woman whose funeral we were attending. But in the South, even this tenuous a relationship is enough to call someone “cousin” – and to ask a favor.
    Hearing I wanted to be a newspaperman, he set up an interview for me with his famous hometown newspaper in Greenville, Mississippi. I landed the job at the paper and the next day began my lifelong interest in Walker’s writings by spending a Saturday with him and his family at their home in Covington, Louisiana.
    That fall, I vowed to read all of Walker’s novels and went to the college bookstore and ordered first editions. His second, third and fourth books were easy to locate. I purchased them for less than $10 each. But the store manager advised me not to buy the first edition of his prize-winning first novel, “The Moviegoer,” because sellers were asking $50. Today, it sells for $2,000.
    At the time, both the price and the premise of the book seemed just out of my reach. I had committed my college years to enjoying every moment because I knew the experience was a short one. I reveled in all I saw and everyone I met. I was on a search for meaning every moment I was there.
    Life beyond college had no roadmap or defining limits. And for a creative type like me, finding meaning in the drudgery of the everyday was a daunting challenge – the same one that haunts this perplexing book’s narrator, Binx Bolling – named perhaps for our relative.
    Every few years, when I would feel lost in a holding pattern of despair, I’d pull this novel off the shelf to remember that the mere act of searching for more meaning in life makes it worth it.
    When Walker autographed my first editions, I promised I would return with a first edition of “The Moviegoer” and thank him for helping me start my career as a newspaperman. But I moved, changed jobs, married, had children and life became all too ordinary in its busyness.
    One day, after a pre-dawn business meeting in Buckhead, I picked up the morning paper. Walker’s obituary was on the front page.
    I was crushed. I had allowed myself to be swallowed by the everyday. That morning, as I trudged into an office building with thousands of other seemingly uninspired employees, I vowed to do better. I promised I would begin a search for a more meaningful job, that I would find a way to thank Walker publicly and that eventually I would find that autographed first edition of The Moviegoer to complete my collection. That final search, at least, continues to this day.

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  • Atlanta,  Media

    Lucky Seven

    January 1, 2001

    This month marks our seventh year of publishing our community newspaper. Given that we have made only minor mistakes in those years, I would have to call this enterprise a lucky one – so far.

    Of course, there have been some close ones.

    In one of my first columns back in 1995, I was clumsily trying to thank a former girlfriend with whom I had just broken up for all the help she had provided me in starting up the newspaper. Unfortunately, my thanks were expressed a little too eloquently and – in combination with heavy use of the past tense – many of my readers thought she had died. I had to correct that in the next edition, which was a painfully long month later.

    We’ve always taken pride in “family-safe” newspaper. Because we deliver to so many homes, we feel we have to be careful not to include information that might be offensive to children. One story about businesses on Lindbergh referred to the “golf club” at the end of the street. Our crackerjack editors proofed every story several times before we went to press. I looked over that issue right before it went out the door and thought for a moment about the golf club. I wasn’t aware of a golf club on Lindbergh, but before I could do anything about it, my phone rang and I forgot about the reference. It was only after a few readers called asking about it that our team discussed the story and we realized the writer meant to say Gold Club. “Oh well,” we said. “Just another effort on our part to protect our readers from sex, politics and crime.”

    A couple of years ago, I wrote a column about dating that my ever-vigilant editor vetoed. “If this ran, you’d never date again!” she said. Another time, she corrected a reference to my ex-wife that forgot to mention the “ex” part. Thanks to Jan for protecting my single status.

    None of these were as serious as the time I worked at The Greenville News in South Carolina and we published a full-page ad for a grocery store that had a sale on “Chicken Things” rather than thighs. As one of the press room guys said later, “I’ve eaten many part of a chicken, but I have never and will never eat that part!”

    One time in Charlotte, the The Observer newsroom ran a story about a city councilman named James Brown. Late at night, one of the younger editors went to grab a photo of the Caucasian gentleman, but instead grabbed and published a photo of the King of Soul with his resplendent huge grin and big hair looking out from a serious story about local sewer repairs.

    But the worst mistake I witnessed was in Augusta at The Chronicle, when we ran the obituary of Nelson S. Jackson, but a late-night copy editor ran the photo of Nelson T. Jackson instead. Nelson T., it turned out, was very alive and well, and also a member of our then-editor’s Rotary Club. The editor quietly took his usual seat at that week’s Rotary Club and endured many embarrassing remarks. But he was most annoyed when Nelson T. walked into the Rotary late and the entire club stood and raised their hands and greeted him with shouts of “Lazarus, Lazarus!”

    When I first joined the Greenville, Mississippi newspaper and was looking forward to my first by-line in that afternoon’s edition, a fire suddenly broke out in the press room and the paper didn’t get published for two days. The publisher looked suspiciously at me, the newest and most questionable hire. Years later at the Fulton County Daily Report, my first day on the job led to several computer crashes that pushed us way past deadline by several hours. My college-age designer sidled up to me in a particularly tense moment and tried to reassure me.

    “It could be worse, Chris,” he said. “Oh yeah, how?” I asked.

    “We could be naked and on fire!”

    I wasn’t reassured, but I did laugh. After nearly 25 years in the business and seven years “on our own,” here at Schroder Publishing, I am happy to report that we can still laugh. Even in these serious times.

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  • Atlanta,  Family

    Election Returns

    December 1, 2000

    I’ve always enjoyed staying up late to watch election results on television. This year was no different. About 3:30 in the morning my telephone rang. It was my friend Charles, who enjoys the process as much as I do. He and I talked for nearly an hour before we agreed the presidential race was not going to be decided anytime soon.

    The next morning I spoke to a civic group. After I recounted three nonpolitical humorous stories from my youth, my audience spent 40 minutes quizzing me about the media and the election. Everyone had an opinion and each took time to express it.

    The next day, I traveled to Charlotte. I began the day on a MARTA bus. Despite a sign saying, “Please do not talk to the driver,” several passengers in the front of the bus carried on a lively discussion with the driver about the latest developments in “The Election Too Close to Call.”

    When I boarded a MARTA train that afternoon, I walked into a car full of conversation. Passengers of different ethnic and socio-economic background were engaged in serious and humorous discussions about the voters in Florida. On any other day, these same people would have sat silently in their seats, exchanging no words between each other until one exited.

    At the airport, great crowds of travelers were huddled in semicircles in front of televisions. People hurrying from other flights would stop and ask about the recount and several strangers would turn to give concise updates. Other passengers, who would normally have sat in silence waiting to board the flight, were engaged in conversation about intricacies of ballot re-counting and the merits of electronic voting.

    The short flight to Charlotte seemed all the more brief when a young schoolteacher took the seat next to me and talked about her first-grade students spending the week debating the Electoral College and Constitution.
    When I arrived in Charlotte, Sally, who turned 18 just days before the election, talked excitedly for an hour about her first voting experience and about which votes should be recounted.

    Elections have traditionally divided us along party lines so it takes statesmanlike qualities for the winners to unite our country afterwards. Suddenly in this age of instant gratification, when we have grown used to watching returns on Web sites and 24-hour news channels, we have been transported back to the 19th century in America, when the country would not find out the winner for weeks after the vote was collected.

    In so doing, the deadlock has forced Americans to return to other forgotten traditions. Instead of proceeding in silence next to our fellow citizens, we are now sparked into engaging them in lively debate.

    On the Saturday after the election, while Florida election officials were holding ballots above their heads to determine if the computer punch-outs that we now know are called “chads” were partially or fully voted, Sally and I were selecting a new puppy for our household. We quickly voted for a cute male of apparent mixed chow and retriever lineage.

    When it came time to name him, I suggested “Chad” in honor of the new word of the day that would no doubt dominate discussion in the next few weeks. She had her own ideas and, as of press time, there is no final decision. But one thing for sure, we will be engaged in lots of discussion on this and other matters of national importance in the weeks to come. And I for one think it is a good thing.

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  • Atlanta,  Family,  Life Stories

    Tagging Along

    November 1, 2000

    A few years ago, after my children and I completed an inspiring tour of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Washington, D.C., we were returning to our prime parking spot right outside the building when my daughter noticed that my license tag was gone. I was mad. Here we were learning about our sophisticated law enforcement while at that very moment, a major crime went unnoticed.

    My son, having been duly impressed by the G-Men on the tour, suggested I report it to the FBI. The security desk radioed upstairs and soon we were leading three or four federal agents down the steps of the J. Edgar Hoover building toward our car.

    “This section of the street is considered federal property,” one G-Man was telling us. “If they stole it from here, then you’ll have the full authority of the FBI behind you.”

    My anger at being a victim suddenly turned to delight as I envisioned some poor unsuspecting dude surrounded by a dozen G-Men yelling: “FBI – Freeze! Give us that Georgia tag back.”

    When we walked up to my car, one of the men started shaking his head.

    “I’m sorry, sir,” he said. “But you are parked 20 feet outside our jurisdiction. We’ll have to call in the D.C. Police on this one. If you had just parked a few spaces down, we could have helped you.”

    Nearly 45 minutes later a cop pulled up, took a few notes before his radio cackled with reports of an armed robbery at a nearby Wendy’s.”

    He scribbled something on a scrap piece of paper and handed it to me. “I’ve got to run. Here’s your incident report number. I’ll write up your incident in a few days and you can request a copy.”

    Back in Atlanta, I went to the county tag office, but they refused me a new one, demanding to see my police report. Calls to the D.C. police found my incident number had not been turned in yet.

    As I stared into my computer screen at work, I searched for a solution. I then did what any good designer would do: I designed my own exact replacement, replete with year and month, the county name and even positioned the state peach behind my number. Then in a burst of honesty, instead of merely typing the state name at the top, I wrote: “Tag Stolen from Georgia.” My coworkers were impressed. So, it seemed, were the police.

    Soon, I was being pulled over all over town. Policemen would walk up to my window, scratch their heads and inevitably begin with, “Sir, where in the world did you get that tag?”

    “I designed it myself, on my computer,” I would say.

    I would then tell my story about taking my kids to visit the FBI and how the G-Men had to call the D.C. policeman, who was called to an armed robbery … yada, yada.

    Some would cut me off with a roll of their eyes and wave me on while others expressed great admiration for my handiwork. One asked about my computer software, and how I scanned the peach. Once I was pulled over twice on the same night on Piedmont Road.

    Realizing I was spending more and more time on the side of the road meeting Atlanta’s finest, I located one clerk in the D.C. police department who took sympathy on my sudden popularity. She promised to harass the original cop until he got his paperwork in. When that proved fruitless, she typed the report herself and faxed it to me.

    Within hours, I was fastening on a new – albeit more boring – state tag on my car. I haven’t seen any blue lights in my mirror since. Next time I go to D.C., I’ll know to park directly in front of the FBI.

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  • Family,  Fatherhood,  Media

    Our Date with Miss Universe

    October 1, 2000

    A few weeks ago, my editor forwarded an e-mail from a New York public relations firm asking if we’d interview Miss Universe 1999 when she was in town for a “hair show.” Trying not to act too eager, I counted to two before running to Jan’s office to volunteer.. She looked at me rather skeptically, as an editor should, wondering if I was the best reporter to cover this important breaking story.

    “What experience do you have in matters of beauty, hair color and makeup that might make you qualified for this assignment?” she asked..

    “Um,” I stammered. “I used to have to blow-dry my long hair in high school, I once put makeup over a pimple and I look at the covers of beauty magazines when I’m in the grocery checkout lines.”

    She wasn’t impressed.

    “I’m also your boss,” I suggested with a smile.

    As the day approached and as I read more about Mpule Kwelagobe, I grew a little nervous. She had been crowned Miss Botswana a few months out of high school and a few months later crowned Miss Universe, and had since traveled to more than a dozen countries; I realized I wasn’t even exactly sure where in Africa Botswana was. I slinked back into Jan’s office.

    “I’m having trouble coming up with questions to ask Miss Universe. What if she doesn’t speak much English? I don’t even know what language they speak in Botswana,” I said.

    She scribbled a few questions on a pad and dismissed me, saying, “You’d better not disappoint me, Schroder!”

    Me_and_miss_universejpg_2

    My son, Thomas, was going to be in town that day, so I asked him if he would like to accompany me and ask a few questions. “Maybe you should leave this to me, Pop,” he said. “After all, I am only four years younger than her. You are old enough to be her …”

    “Her photographer,” I said. “That’s it. You ask her questions and I’ll take photographs.”

    As it turned out, my fears were unfounded. Mpule spoke fluent English with a charming British accent. Botswana is the second-richest country in Africa and a former British colony, and she had excelled in the British-style schools. Mpule was a live wire and loved to talk.

    Thomas_and_miss_universejpg

    She talked about how she had postponed attending the University of South Africa on an engineering scholarship to be the first representative from her country ever to enter the Miss Universe pageant. She told us about the infighting at the pageants, the host newspaper in Trinidad that said she would never win, about how she was the first winner to ever walk away with a commercial contract such as hers with Clairol. She is most passionate about the scourge of AIDS, which affects 1 out of 5 young people on her continent, and how she hopes to fight it.

    When she left Botswana for the pageant in May 1999, 10 people saw her off at the airport. When she returned, 250,000 people – nearly her entire country – were at the stadium to cheer her. “More people than turned out to see Bill Clinton or Pope John Paul or Nelson Mandela,” she said with pride. Recently, the political parties in her country have been asking her to run for office, but she has put them off.

    “I want to return to college in a couple of years and then, perhaps when I turn 25 or 30, I will run for president of my country. You will have to come and visit my country then,” she said.

    Thomas looked at me, no doubt hoping I would book travel reservations on the spot.

    “You’ve got my vote,” I told her. Thomas and I walked away with photos, autographs and a heightened respect for Botswana. As if she hasn’t won enough awards, Mpule has earned a permanent spot on Thomas’s personal Web site.

    Photos: Left, Chris with Miss Universe, Mpule Kwelagobe, and Thomas with her, right. I think she’s happier with Thomas … what do you think?

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  • Atlanta,  Life Stories

    The Boys from Atlanta

    September 1, 2000

    My friends and I usually caravan to the New Orleans Jazz Festival every spring, but one year, my friend Tommy Calk and I were unable to clear a long weekend. T.C., a pediatrician, studied this emergency and quickly prescribed a solution: “We need to make a surgical strike.”

    As part of the tradition, our friend Charles Driebe was in charge of accommodations. Each year, he would meet and woo a New Orleans woman, maintain a relationship with her at least long enough for T.C. and me to come crash in her apartment, and then find another for the next year after she inevitably grew tired of us and threw the three of us out in the street. This particular year, Charles had secured excellent accommodations: His girlfriend’s apartment was within walking distance of the festival.

    Another important ritual involved the first night in town. We would have a dozen oysters, soft-shell crabs and beer at the Acme Oyster House, followed by a performance by the famous local musical family, the Neville Brothers.

    This Friday night found T.C. and me dashing by taxi from the airport to Acme and then dropping off our bags at Charles’ base camp. We were unable to hail a taxi to the concert at the coliseum uptown, so we stopped a bus, asked the driver how to get there and he waved us on board. A few blocks later, he flashed his lights at a bus at an intersection and told us to run catch it. We were then deposited at the auditorium front door.

    But tragedy struck: We found the ticket booth closed and doors to the auditorium locked. We could hear a warm-up band playing, so we banged on doors until an employee appeared.

    “We need a ticket to the concert, but the booth is closed,” we pleaded.

    “We’re all sold out,” she said dryly, closing the door.

    “But, but, you don’t understand. We drove all the way from Atlanta just to see the Neville Brothers.”

    She looked skeptically at us, said “Wait a minute,” and closed the door.

    T.C. and I stood there wondering if our luck had run out. Minutes raced by. We were about to bang on the door again when it suddenly flew open and a very authoritative man looked at us and yelled, “Are you the boys from Atlanta who drove down to see the Nevilles?”

    “Yes,” we said nervously.

    Then he smiled, gave us an envelope and said, “Here. Two of the best seats in the house – on me.”

    T.C. and I tried to contain our glee. We raced inside, grabbed a beer and ran to our seats near the stage. Just as we sat down, the lights lowered and the Nevilles were announced. It was as if they were waiting for the boys from Atlanta to take our seats.

    After the show, we walked outside to the taxi stand, but we had to get in a line of people perhaps 50 yards long – all waiting for taxis, which were nowhere in sight.

    Suddenly, a man walked up to the line and yelled, “Anybody need a ride into town?” T.C. and I took a nano-second to run up and volunteer.

    As we enjoyed our quiet ride home, through the streets of New Orleans, we giggled as we recounted our luck. The driver asked if we had tickets to see the sold-out Allman Brothers show at the same auditorium the next night. “No,” we said and then discussed our prospects of banging on the doors and saying, “We drove all the way from Atlanta just to see the Allman Brothers!”

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  • Fatherhood

    Getting a roommate

    August 1, 2000

    I spent July 4th enjoying my last day of independence. The next day, I rented a van, drove to Charlotte and picked up my first roommate in eight years.

    For many years, I used to come home to a spouse, two children, a dog, two cats, two hamsters, eight fish and a turtle. Then, one day, I started coming home to … silence. At first this took a little adjustment. I enjoy my quiet time more than most people, but for the first few years, I made sure I had a good number of events on my calendar. Back then, if I saw a totally empty weekend ahead on my calendar, I began telemarketing to fill up the slots. But in the past few years, if I saw an empty weekend looming, I guarded it jealously, relishing the solitude.

    All that energy I stored up is in full demand by my new arrangement with my 17-year-old daughter, Sally. We’re spending lots of time together, talking about some issues in her life and working out her plans for the next year or two.

    When you live alone, you fall into habits and rhythms without realizing it. Add someone else to your space and you begin to look at things differently.

    For instance, I now have to remember to wear clothes when I walk around my house, which is way up on a hill and beyond the eyes of neighbors – lucky for them! If I wake up early, I can’t blast loud music to get my heart jump-started. I find myself keeping the kitchen cleaner since I won’t be the only one walking in there. I neatly stack the newspapers in the recycling pile, rather than leaving them on the floor. Dirty clothes go quickly into the hamper rather than pausing – for weeks sometimes – on a bedroom chair.

    I have a fine old stove, but there was a time last year I considered having a plumber install a cut-off valve for the natural gas line leading to it. Since my at-home eating tastes had gravitated toward cereal, salads, fruit and yogurt, I went almost a year without turning on the stove. I felt guilty running those pilot lights all day and night. Now I cook frequently, even surprising myself with my domestic capability by producing three differently colored items from various food groups arranged smartly on two plates. Arranging settings for two at my kitchen or dining room tables was a surprisingly fun experience. I’m sure I’ll get over it.

    I’ve been leaving my car at home for my daughter’s use and recently took a cue from a salesperson who lives down the street. I hopped on board a bus near my house and stepped off at the front door of our downtown office building. During the short ride, I read the newspaper and looked at stores and houses I’ve never noticed before.

    We’ve had some memorable moments. One night she was going to bed as I was just getting up. She had been chatting on the computer with all her friends. She has helped me prepare for two birthday parties, helping cook one shrimp-and-grits entrée and running to the store to get a last-minute birthday card. We’ve been shopping together for my house and I have appreciated her sense of design. She’s been accompanying me lately to dinners and concerts and trips to the movie store.

    The funny thing is, I’ve already gotten attached to having my daughter back in my house. I know I will really miss her when she moves on.

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