Lent Day 13: The Graveyard Shift

 

Dedicated to Pippa Walker

In my first year of university I fancied myself a journalist and registered for a coveted BJourn degree at Rhodes. I studied with some of the greats in journalism. I wasn't, however, one of the greats myself. 

What I did do, however, was get myself a slot on Rhodes Music Radio. My friend Manuella (name changed to protect highly successful international PR company) and I pitched the idea for a radio show and the management wisely relegated us a graveyard shift once a week on a nebulous school night. Not that Rhodes ever really had school nights. I like to think that at any given moment, at any given time of the day, there was a cheese and wine happening somewhere. 

Anyway, once a week Manuella and I would go to the RMR library. We'd select the same ten cds every week and we'd play the same love sings every Tuesday from 2:00 to 4:00 am. I'm using the royal 'we' here because I seldom presented the actual show with Manuella. She spent more time passed out on the siff RMR couch than actually on air with me. Sometimes our friends would join us fresh from The Rat and would weep inconsolably into the mic after the latest breakup or heart break. Hundreds of love songs were also dedicated to the crush of the moment. It was the most unprofessional radio show in the history of radio shows. 

But I remember a definite highlight in my very short lived radio career. Every night we would repeatedly call out our phone number in the hope that by some miracle some lonely (and somewhat desperate) insomniac would sms us to tell us they were listening. And one night we got a message! One whole message, from Dawn (how appropriate was the name?) to tell us that she was listening and that she loved our music.

Dawn then got two solid hours of music, dedications and one way conversation targeted her way over the airways. Dawn is still one of my favourite people because she took the trouble to help two absolutely useless radio DJs feel heard. Even if it was quite hard to hear one because her speech was so slurred. 

Today Stephen bumped into a friend of mine at school drop off. She told him that she looks forward to reading my lent blogs everyday. And I suddenly had another Dawn moment. 

So Pippa Walker thanks for braving the graveyard shift with me and my writing. In keeping with the mood of the night and the year of 2002 here's a ballad to keep those home fires burning. This one goes out to Pippa Walker...Enrique Iglesias's 'Hero'. Cue music...