03-31-11 “Are you thinking of telephones? And Managers and where you’ve got to be at noon…”

03-31-11
“Are you thinking of telephones? And Managers and where you’ve got to be at noon…”
Lindsay is a nocturnal creature by profession. That’s not accurate. He is a producer of late night shows and so his normal work day is 8pm to around 2am. But he is a person who is always on “go” except for the few hours he sleeps. Perhaps he is like Michael Bloomfield, burning the candle at both ends. Or maybe he’s like Mischa, who can go to sleep with no preamble, on demand, so to speak.
I have too little samples to tell but he seems to be sharp and awake whenever he is awake. I say this because he’s told me he will wake late today to reset his internal clock for work tonight. It is the last show of one of his show hosts who is being downsized. The corporation that now owns the station has replaced him with “canned programming” in the 8 to midnight time slot. Lindsay wants to make it a good show and have a fitting farewell to acknowledge his host.
He gets up around 1pm. I’ve occupied myself writing and typing past notes and walking Mischa. When he is up we are off on a whirlwind of activity. To Sam’s club where he fills both his and my gas tanks (Thanks Rocky!) We leave my car and drive off to his record store to sell some discs he got as promos. On the way to the Sam’s I noticed a street called “Planer Terrace”. I ask him about it on the way to the record store. “Yeah, the street was named for me a couple of weeks before I was born. There is another street called Lindsay named for me too.” His family goes deep in the history of the community. His father owned textile mills and his uncle was in real estate. He remembers how small and tight nit the community of Gastonia had been as he grew up. That is one of the appeals to the place still. Small important community businesses that haven’t been co-opted by the multi-national companies who only have one purpose - profit. Not the thing they make. “As long as that is still here, I’ll probably stay” “I have a feeling I’m supposed to be on the west coast and I think I’ll get there soon, but as long as this place hasn’t been co-opted, it’s still home.”
We come back to Walmart (conveniently next to Sam’s Club) and get some items he needs for his house. We head next to his dry cleaners…he’s on the cell as he often is and I wait until he’s off to tell him “my car is back there”.
Dude, you should have told me.
You were in a conversation.
Well, nudge me of whack me.
Well, I knew the way back to your place but would be waiting for you to get back anyway cuz I don’t have a way into your place.
See! You’re thinking ahead. Man, I haven’t asked, are you hungry?
It’s about 2:54 and I haven’t had anything except O.J. that morning
“I could eat”.
I’ll take you to another local legend “The Shrimp Boat”. Do you like Chicken?
(chuckle) Yeah, don’t they have seafood there?
Yeah but they do chicken strips that are great…and they have other things. They’re another family owned place that has been in the same place since I was born. Well, If you recommend it, I’m in. We go there and order Chicken Strips & Hush Puppies and he gets two burgers and extra fries and hush puppies.
Lindsay gets another call. He takes it outside while waiting for the food order to come. Lindsay is wired. Wired to the cell and Facebook and work emails and calls from close friends…and to the town he grew up in. Not an edgy Ratso Rizzo wired, more of a cloud city communicator or Norm from Cheers. Comfortable, competent and connected. We talk thru the meal about many things the conversation is fluid and mercurial darting about many ideas and topics without ever getting lost.
We finish and go to his dry cleaners and retrieve my car and then it’s time for him to go to work. I am left to write and when it gets around midnight to sleep. I hear him get home I’m presuming around 2-3 am and he is busy doing things in his office next to the room I’m in. I almost get up to see how the show was and talk a little more but I’m just more tired than talkative and I know I’m going to be back on the road early tomorrow so I take the opportunity for sleep. Hopefully I’ll have time to interview Lindsay in the morning before he has to take off and Mischa & I have to go. I sleep.