1
00:00:14,119 --> 00:00:18,160
Speaker 1: I swear I never thought the day would come when

2
00:00:18,199 --> 00:00:22,120
I would arrive for a summer weekend at a rural

3
00:00:22,239 --> 00:00:27,839
paradise and suddenly be in a panic that I may

4
00:00:27,920 --> 00:00:32,840
have left the charger for my hearing age at home

5
00:00:33,520 --> 00:00:37,439
in the city. I never thought I would see that day,

6
00:00:38,399 --> 00:00:42,600
but now I have. I once was young and gay,

7
00:00:42,880 --> 00:00:46,600
I mean not gay and today since but what we

8
00:00:46,759 --> 00:00:51,079
meant back in nineteen sixty two. I once was, and

9
00:00:51,119 --> 00:00:55,719
I could hear a pin drop, And now I couldn't

10
00:00:55,759 --> 00:00:59,560
hear a bowling pin if it dropped on my head.

11
00:01:00,560 --> 00:01:07,359
I suffered this plague for you, my beloved listeners, because

12
00:01:07,439 --> 00:01:12,840
in your service, I turned the headphones up too high,

13
00:01:13,959 --> 00:01:19,519
Because being young and gay, I felt that music needed

14
00:01:19,599 --> 00:01:25,359
to be loud to be a full emotional experience, that

15
00:01:25,439 --> 00:01:31,760
the body itself needed to vibrate vigorously. I was wrong.

16
00:01:32,719 --> 00:01:36,159
I know that now, and now is much too late.

17
00:01:37,040 --> 00:01:42,400
At any rate, I did not leave the charger at home.

18
00:01:42,920 --> 00:01:48,439
It was simply in a secret compartment of my briefcase,

19
00:01:48,560 --> 00:01:52,680
the sort of place one might keep nuclear secrets, if

20
00:01:52,719 --> 00:01:58,840
there were such a thing. So I wore my hearing

21
00:01:58,920 --> 00:02:04,280
age to dinner at the neighbors, and so I could

22
00:02:04,400 --> 00:02:10,360
understand them to the extent that language is part of understanding.

23
00:02:10,439 --> 00:02:14,599
Otherwise it would have been like an evening among the

24
00:02:14,639 --> 00:02:18,840
Sanskrit fluent, and I would have had to maintain a

25
00:02:18,919 --> 00:02:24,360
facial expression of comprehension and curiosity. And this is no

26
00:02:24,599 --> 00:02:30,520
easy matter. My facial muscle memory is a scowl I

27
00:02:30,639 --> 00:02:35,919
learned in my fundamentalist youth. It's hard to overcome the

28
00:02:35,960 --> 00:02:41,919
influence of Jeremiah at the age of eighty two. I

29
00:02:42,039 --> 00:02:47,800
do not understand the neighbors actually, such as why their

30
00:02:47,879 --> 00:02:55,120
summer house has landscaping and lawn ornaments. A summer house

31
00:02:56,240 --> 00:03:02,319
is for relaxation. It isn't for demonstrating craftsmanship. You're supposed

32
00:03:02,360 --> 00:03:06,840
to sit on the porch and read Proost. You're not

33
00:03:06,879 --> 00:03:11,319
supposed to create a home that Proust would have envied.

34
00:03:12,479 --> 00:03:17,439
And I don't understand why a copy of Foreign Affairs

35
00:03:17,639 --> 00:03:23,919
magazine sits on their kitchen counter in the den, out

36
00:03:24,000 --> 00:03:29,360
of sight. Yes, in the kitchen, people are eating in

37
00:03:29,439 --> 00:03:35,919
the kitchen. Foreign Affairs is the diplomatic version of the

38
00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:41,479
prophet Jeremiah, who said the heart is deceitful above all

39
00:03:41,639 --> 00:03:47,599
things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? Foreign Affairs

40
00:03:48,240 --> 00:03:53,000
says pretty much the same thing, except for real. Ukraine

41
00:03:53,560 --> 00:03:58,599
and Gozm are sort of covered in the newspapers, but

42
00:03:58,879 --> 00:04:04,919
terrible things are happening everywhere, so much so that you

43
00:04:05,080 --> 00:04:10,520
don't want to know about it. Let Anthony Blincoln know

44
00:04:10,680 --> 00:04:15,719
about it. This is why foreign policy is a minor

45
00:04:15,840 --> 00:04:22,199
footnote in our presidential elections, somewhat less important than bike

46
00:04:22,319 --> 00:04:27,120
lanes or prayer in public schools. Can students in English

47
00:04:27,160 --> 00:04:31,920
classes be assigned books in which prayer occurs, even if

48
00:04:32,000 --> 00:04:37,360
the book is clearly labeled fiction. The reason the candidates

49
00:04:37,560 --> 00:04:41,759
don't discuss foreign policy is that they don't want to

50
00:04:41,839 --> 00:04:47,480
scare you. And what would really scare you is how

51
00:04:47,560 --> 00:04:53,600
little some of them are even curious about foreign policy,

52
00:04:54,600 --> 00:04:58,759
and the very good chance that some of them might

53
00:04:58,839 --> 00:05:04,040
be elected to my office. If you knew, you would

54
00:05:04,040 --> 00:05:08,759
want to form your own nation, just as the Danes

55
00:05:08,920 --> 00:05:14,079
and Finns have done. So. I made the mistake of

56
00:05:14,879 --> 00:05:19,480
asking the Woman of the House why the Foreign Affairs magazine,

57
00:05:20,240 --> 00:05:25,920
expecting her to say, oh, that's his michigos. She's Catholic,

58
00:05:25,959 --> 00:05:29,680
but we all love yet Asha really brightens up her sentence,

59
00:05:29,800 --> 00:05:34,759
but now she means it. She's in the investment business.

60
00:05:34,800 --> 00:05:38,879
I thought women were more noble than that busy curing

61
00:05:39,079 --> 00:05:46,680
cancer and starvation, that hiding income in offshore shelters. So

62
00:05:46,759 --> 00:05:52,240
she starts telling me what she's recently read in foreign affairs,

63
00:05:53,279 --> 00:05:58,720
and in twenty minutes she cast a dark shadow over

64
00:05:58,800 --> 00:06:04,600
the entire evening, which had been all gaiety right up

65
00:06:04,639 --> 00:06:11,160
to that exact point. There were humorous hosts, excellent pasta

66
00:06:12,120 --> 00:06:17,959
fine wine, a lovely salad, a beautiful one year old

67
00:06:18,040 --> 00:06:22,720
boy who really pays attention to people, and I swear

68
00:06:22,879 --> 00:06:29,120
he is grasping the emotional richness of language, and he's

69
00:06:29,319 --> 00:06:35,399
eager and ambitious to talk the child's proud parents, my

70
00:06:35,519 --> 00:06:40,480
own dear wife and daughter, plus me a published author.

71
00:06:40,759 --> 00:06:45,759
And yet in twenty minutes of international trouble spots, he

72
00:06:45,920 --> 00:06:52,040
did not leave out many areas maybe Monaco, maybe Liechtenstein.

73
00:06:52,800 --> 00:06:58,199
The effect was to put us all in a blue funk.

74
00:06:59,319 --> 00:07:02,879
I tried to lighten the mood with a harmless joke,

75
00:07:03,879 --> 00:07:08,279
and it wasn't harmless. It made fun of third grade teachers,

76
00:07:09,199 --> 00:07:15,319
most of whom are probably female, an oppressed lot. So

77
00:07:15,399 --> 00:07:21,079
we went home. Don't listen to anything about foreign affairs.

78
00:07:22,040 --> 00:07:26,720
If someone tries to tell you just take off your

79
00:07:26,720 --> 00:07:32,720
hearing aids. A Prairie Own Companion's fiftieth anniversary two CD

80
00:07:32,879 --> 00:07:36,120
set is packed with music, favorite sketches, and of course,

81
00:07:36,360 --> 00:07:39,879
the news from Lake Wobegon. The Rollicking celebration was recorded

82
00:07:39,920 --> 00:07:43,439
live at the Fitzgerald Theater. More info at Garrison Keeler

83
00:07:43,519 --> 00:07:44,199
dot com