Mr. Killingsworth what he could do with his checks and stapled payment cards and I would be out of there, leaving the others to torment and doom.
What else helped was that life outside the office was wonderful. Ronnie and I hadn’t been mugged in the neighborhood, Paula and I had graduated into another level of romance. And we had found a place to buy beer where they didn’t check your ID.
And I would soon be the recipient of an incredible break. From the bad start at the newspaper, from my three hours as a walking encyclopedia salesman, from dingbats who would round off their checks and staple them to their loan-payment cards. I would meet a man, and he would put in motion how I got from the summer of ’64 to the spring of ’77, where this adventure is ultimately headed.
“Balls,” cried the queen. “If I had ’em I’d be king.”
—An old expression regarding courage.
I HADN’T HAD the guts to try to see Furman Bisher again that summer. After the episode of viewing his office—the Throne Room—I decided it would not be wise to show up there with no education and no experience. He’d probably just say, “Come back to see me in four years” or, worse, “Get out of my office, kid.”
But I was sitting in the apartment one night watching the television Ronnie’s parents had given him for graduation. It had a screen the size of a pocket watch. If you strained your eyes, you occasionally could make out a human form.
The CBS affiliate six o’clock news came on. More on the civil-rights movement and Goldwater.
Following the news and the weather came sports, and the familiar face and voice of Ed Thelinius, the station sports director, who also broadcast the radio play-by-play of University of Georgia football games.
I didn’t really want a career in sports broadcasting, but it occurred to me as I watched Ed Thelinius that maybe I could sit down with him and tell him of my plans and he could give me some help. I was hoping his help would be: “Next time I run into Furman Bisher, I’ll mention your name,” or “Want to do my show tonight?”
With trembling hands, during my morning break the next day at the bank, I cold-called Ed Thelinius at his television station. It took some guts.
Ed Thelinius, or at least his voice, had become legendary in Georgia. He never got rattled like some football announcers and made the mistake of screaming into the microphone such phrases as “We score!” or “Would you look at that son of a bitch run!” which some announcer said once if I am to believe a radio blooper record I heard.
Thelinius was extremely low-key. He would have handled the explosion of the Hindenberg like this:
“Here comes the Hindenberg. There goes the Hindenberg.”
Thelinius did have his pet sayings, of course. Most sportscasters do. Red Barber said, when Bobby Thompson hit the home run to beat the Dodgers in the pennant play-offs in 1951, “Well, I’ll be a suck-egg mule.”
I suppose I should explain that statement. Red Barber came from the South, and southerners are taken to referring to animals to explain the current state of our emotions. “I’ll be a suck-egg mule” was Red Barber’s southern way of saying, “Blow me down and call me Shorty,” or “I’m not believing this, sports fans.”
Southerners, attempting to explain great joy, might say, “I’m happy as a pig in slop.” They might express their exhaustion by saying, “I feel like I’ve been rode hard and put up wet.”
Come to think of it, southerners use animals to explain just about anything, such as the answer to “Where’s John Earl?” The answer there is, “He went to the woods to take a crap, and the bears ate him.”
I suppose I should also explain the term “suck-egg mule.” Certain animals are taken to performing the dastardly act of getting into the henhouse and partaking of the eggs. Dogs are particularly bad to do such a thing, thus the phrases “You dirty ol’ egg-sucking dog” and “Lassie sucked eggs,” which I saw written on a rest-room wall once in Tupelo, Mississippi.
I really didn’t know mules would also suck eggs, but if Red Barber referred to himself as he did in 1951, I figure he had personal knowledge of such a quirk in the personality of this particular animal. I have never witnessed a chicken play the piano, but a friend said he did at a county fair. You simply must take somebody’s word on occasion.
Ed Thelinius. When Georgia went into its huddle in those days, five players would line up abreast, and then five more would move into the same formation behind them. The quarterback would then face his teammates and call the play.
Whenever Georgia huddled, Thelinius would say to his audience, “Tarkenton talks to his two rows of five.”
What he was most noted for, however, was what he said before each opening kickoff. Very few college football games were televised in those days, so Thelinius attempted to give the listener some sort of orientation as to which team was defending which goal.
He would do that by saying, “Imagine your radio as the field in front of me. Georgia will be moving up on the dial, while Auburn will be moving down.”
Clever. Of course, that led to a lot of takeoffs, such as one that went, “Imagine your radio as the field as I see it. The red marks will be Georgia and the black will be Auburn. The dial will be the football.”
This was before the digital radio. In fact, this was before a lot of things, such as instant replay, the Copper Bowl, SAT requirements, and the ACLU filing a lawsuit because somebody said a prayer before the game.
Getting Ed Thelinius on the phone that day was surprisingly easy. The station operator answered, I asked for “Mr. Thelinius,” she rang his line, and he picked up.
“Thelinius,” he said.
That’s one thing you learn in journalism school. The proper way for a journalist of any kind to answer the phone is by saying his or her last name. It sounds official. Big-time official, like a guy carrying a clipboard with a pencil tied to it.
“Mr. Thelinius,” I began, noticing once more my greeting was offered with my voice getting higher on the “inius” and a question mark on the end of it. I’m seventeen years old, and I’m talking to a legend. What would you expect?
After the “Mr. Thelinius,” I said, “My name is Lewis Grizzard, and I work in the loan-payment department of the First National Bank, but I’m not going to be here much longer, although please don’t mention that to anybody who works here because I neglected to mention I’d be leaving after the summer to attend the University of Georgia. . . .”
With that out of my dry mouth, I suddenly thought, Why am I telling Ed Thelinius I’m a liar? I want to gain this man’s trust, and in the first thirty seconds I’ve told him I lie like a dog? (Again, the animal reference.)
But I pressed on, hoping he would forget about my opening statement. “I intend to major in journalism, sir, and I eventually would like to have a career in sportswriting. I realize you are not a sportswriter but a sports caster, but I still feel any advice and help you could give me would be quite worthwhile. I was wondering if there might be some time for me to come over to the station and speak with you. It shouldn’t take long. I’m merely
