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Give Blood for the Gipper!
Mar. 30th, 2021 10:18 pm(Reprinted, with some editing, from the friends-locked entry at https://luscious-purple.livejournal.com/425258.html. I have eliminated the usernames of some people no longer on LJ/DW, so I might as well make this an unlocked post.)
Twenty-five years ago (NOW FORTY YEARS AGO) today ... I had finished college a semester and was out getting my first taste of the working world in Boston. During the day I worked for office temp agencies when they had work. (Two years of business typing had given me a semi-marketable skill outside journalism; I quite prided myself on being able to set up and type complex tables on the typewriter by backspacing from the center of the page.) Some evenings I worked from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Red Cross building near Kenmore Square; the job was to call past blood donors and ask them to roll up their sleeves again.
I remember starting one temp assignment in the New England Merchants National Bank building near Boston City Hall. (Don't ask me what that building is called today in the wake of all the bank mergers that have happened since.) I reported to the twelfth floor, I think, and was seated at one of two desks in the reception area. I typed up some letters on the IBM Selectric typewriter. At the other reception-area desk, one of the permanent secretaries was typing things into a Wang word-processing terminal. A second secretary would come in and out of another office to exchange papers with the first one, schmooze with her, and whatnot. I can't remember their names after all these years.
It was a very uneventful, boring day until sometime in the middle of the afternoon. While I was placidly typing away at some boring letter that didn't need to be entered into the Wang system, secretary #2 sauntered up to the desk of secretary #1.
"Did you hear what happened to Reagan and his press secretary?" secretary #2 asked casually, as if she was telling a story about a couple of co-workers.
"No," said secretary #1.
"They were shot," said secretary #2, as if she was reporting that somebody's kid had been accepted at college or something.
She went back to her own desk, and as the new temp, I was totally unacknowledged and ignored. But I heard every word of the brief exchange, and suddenly my hands were wet and clammy and shaking like a leaf. I had to excuse myself and go to the bathroom, where I sat on the toilet and tried to compose myself.
Now, I was not, am not, never was, never will be a fan of Reagan. Bleah. But during the 1980 primary season, my friends and I at my college newspaper had concluded that George H.W. Bush was even scarier than Reagan, because Bush (there was only one in public life then) had said (during a debate, I think) that "nuclear war is winnable." So the idea that the finger on the nuclear trigger might be connected to someone who thought he could win the game of mutual assured destruction was quite terrifying.
Not to mention the A-word (assassination). The earliest memory I have that I can date exactly is November 22, 1963, and as a kid growing up in Massachusetts, I'd read all I could about that tragic day. From all I'd ever read and heard, people stopped whatever they were doing when they heard the news -- people went home early from work and school -- it was a HUGE DEAL that John F. Kennedy had been slain.
I went back to my desk and was freaked out that everything was still normal. Secretary #1 was still typing away on her terminal. Down the hallway I could see other people at their desks. Nobody was running around or freaking out. I could hardly believe I was the only one who was scared shitless. For the millionth time I felt that adolescent angst against the corporate world.
I was twitchy all the way through the last couple of hours at the job, and once I established that they wanted me back for a second day (I ended up spending five or six weeks there), I practically vaulted out of the building. To burn off some energy I walked up Tremont Street toward Park Street station instead of getting on the T at Government Center. My mind was consumed with one question: "WHAT HAPPENED?" Somehow I wanted to hear the news ... but how. The year was nineteen-freaking-eighty-one. The Walkman was a brand-new product and not many people had them, or their Walkmen (Walkmans?) played only cassette tapes and didn't have a radio. Tremont Street didn't have any stores with TV sets in the windows, and I didn't have time to make a detour to Jordan Marsh and Filene's in Downtown Crossing, because I was supposed to be on my way to Kenmore Square for the Red Cross job. A guy was selling the Boston Globe in front of the Park Street entrance, but even the evening edition didn't say anything about the assassination attempt, and the guy who was selling the papers said he hadn't heard anything. Aack! My brain was demanding a 21st-century news cycle in a 20th-century world....
By the time I got off the T, I realized I had to make a detour on my way to the Red Cross building. I had to get myself to a place where I knew there was a functioning Associated Press teletype machine clacking out news stories at 64 words per minute. So I practically ran over to the old familiar building on Cummington Street and burst through the front door. Fortunately, since I had just graduated, I still knew most everyone on the staff. The news editor was standing at the reception desk.
"Christopher!" I shouted at him. (I sometimes called him that because, for a while, he had been dating a Christine.) "Who is the president of the United States?"
"It's still Reagan," that Christopher said. "He's in surgery. Don't worry, we're on top of things."
Well, I'd given so much sweat and tears and other bodily fluids to that newspaper over the years, how could I *not* care about how it was covering the story? I was just thankful to get an update on the situation. In this day and age where we get instant CNN alerts in our e-mail boxes, it seems downright quaint to recall how information-deprived I felt that day.
I went off to the Red Cross and distinctly remember that I was assigned to calling the B-negatives that night (past donors were classified according to their blood types). When I called one man, his wife answered the phone, and then I heard her say, "Honey, it's for you, they want you to give blood for Reagan!" And I just sat there, ever the good liberal, squirming and thinking, "I didn't say THAT! I don't even know what his blood type is!" (Or was. Still don't.)
Anyhow, the world has certainly changed. I've been to that Hilton where the shooting took place. I've attended scientific meetings and black-tie dinners there. And I work just a few blocks down the hill [or I did back in 2006]....
Over and out....
Twenty-five years ago (NOW FORTY YEARS AGO) today ... I had finished college a semester and was out getting my first taste of the working world in Boston. During the day I worked for office temp agencies when they had work. (Two years of business typing had given me a semi-marketable skill outside journalism; I quite prided myself on being able to set up and type complex tables on the typewriter by backspacing from the center of the page.) Some evenings I worked from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Red Cross building near Kenmore Square; the job was to call past blood donors and ask them to roll up their sleeves again.
I remember starting one temp assignment in the New England Merchants National Bank building near Boston City Hall. (Don't ask me what that building is called today in the wake of all the bank mergers that have happened since.) I reported to the twelfth floor, I think, and was seated at one of two desks in the reception area. I typed up some letters on the IBM Selectric typewriter. At the other reception-area desk, one of the permanent secretaries was typing things into a Wang word-processing terminal. A second secretary would come in and out of another office to exchange papers with the first one, schmooze with her, and whatnot. I can't remember their names after all these years.
It was a very uneventful, boring day until sometime in the middle of the afternoon. While I was placidly typing away at some boring letter that didn't need to be entered into the Wang system, secretary #2 sauntered up to the desk of secretary #1.
"Did you hear what happened to Reagan and his press secretary?" secretary #2 asked casually, as if she was telling a story about a couple of co-workers.
"No," said secretary #1.
"They were shot," said secretary #2, as if she was reporting that somebody's kid had been accepted at college or something.
She went back to her own desk, and as the new temp, I was totally unacknowledged and ignored. But I heard every word of the brief exchange, and suddenly my hands were wet and clammy and shaking like a leaf. I had to excuse myself and go to the bathroom, where I sat on the toilet and tried to compose myself.
Now, I was not, am not, never was, never will be a fan of Reagan. Bleah. But during the 1980 primary season, my friends and I at my college newspaper had concluded that George H.W. Bush was even scarier than Reagan, because Bush (there was only one in public life then) had said (during a debate, I think) that "nuclear war is winnable." So the idea that the finger on the nuclear trigger might be connected to someone who thought he could win the game of mutual assured destruction was quite terrifying.
Not to mention the A-word (assassination). The earliest memory I have that I can date exactly is November 22, 1963, and as a kid growing up in Massachusetts, I'd read all I could about that tragic day. From all I'd ever read and heard, people stopped whatever they were doing when they heard the news -- people went home early from work and school -- it was a HUGE DEAL that John F. Kennedy had been slain.
I went back to my desk and was freaked out that everything was still normal. Secretary #1 was still typing away on her terminal. Down the hallway I could see other people at their desks. Nobody was running around or freaking out. I could hardly believe I was the only one who was scared shitless. For the millionth time I felt that adolescent angst against the corporate world.
I was twitchy all the way through the last couple of hours at the job, and once I established that they wanted me back for a second day (I ended up spending five or six weeks there), I practically vaulted out of the building. To burn off some energy I walked up Tremont Street toward Park Street station instead of getting on the T at Government Center. My mind was consumed with one question: "WHAT HAPPENED?" Somehow I wanted to hear the news ... but how. The year was nineteen-freaking-eighty-one. The Walkman was a brand-new product and not many people had them, or their Walkmen (Walkmans?) played only cassette tapes and didn't have a radio. Tremont Street didn't have any stores with TV sets in the windows, and I didn't have time to make a detour to Jordan Marsh and Filene's in Downtown Crossing, because I was supposed to be on my way to Kenmore Square for the Red Cross job. A guy was selling the Boston Globe in front of the Park Street entrance, but even the evening edition didn't say anything about the assassination attempt, and the guy who was selling the papers said he hadn't heard anything. Aack! My brain was demanding a 21st-century news cycle in a 20th-century world....
By the time I got off the T, I realized I had to make a detour on my way to the Red Cross building. I had to get myself to a place where I knew there was a functioning Associated Press teletype machine clacking out news stories at 64 words per minute. So I practically ran over to the old familiar building on Cummington Street and burst through the front door. Fortunately, since I had just graduated, I still knew most everyone on the staff. The news editor was standing at the reception desk.
"Christopher!" I shouted at him. (I sometimes called him that because, for a while, he had been dating a Christine.) "Who is the president of the United States?"
"It's still Reagan," that Christopher said. "He's in surgery. Don't worry, we're on top of things."
Well, I'd given so much sweat and tears and other bodily fluids to that newspaper over the years, how could I *not* care about how it was covering the story? I was just thankful to get an update on the situation. In this day and age where we get instant CNN alerts in our e-mail boxes, it seems downright quaint to recall how information-deprived I felt that day.
I went off to the Red Cross and distinctly remember that I was assigned to calling the B-negatives that night (past donors were classified according to their blood types). When I called one man, his wife answered the phone, and then I heard her say, "Honey, it's for you, they want you to give blood for Reagan!" And I just sat there, ever the good liberal, squirming and thinking, "I didn't say THAT! I don't even know what his blood type is!" (Or was. Still don't.)
Anyhow, the world has certainly changed. I've been to that Hilton where the shooting took place. I've attended scientific meetings and black-tie dinners there. And I work just a few blocks down the hill [or I did back in 2006]....
Over and out....
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