Author: Eric Margerum

Margerumalia – Thesaurus Anyone?

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – August 1, 2025

PHOTO: Facebook @ForReadingAddicts

Have you had it up to here with hearing the word “unprecedented”? I have. 

The other day a news anchor interrupted herself to apologize for using the word before she said it. Again. When “unprecedented” becomes attached to “sorry for using this word so much” it’s time to stop using it. Don’t ya think?

It’s like the commercials on TV that cause us to dive for the remote and desperately stab at the mute button so we don’t have to hear that annoying voice yet again. 

I don’t do that with Progressive commercials because they’re so creative and humorous, and they’re usually replaced before I can grow weary of them.

Using my Merriam-Webster Thesaurus app, I found several substitutes for unprecedented. Words like fresh, new, novel, original, pioneering, and trailblazing all have a degree of admiration that might be too much praise for a news program, but words like unconventional, unheard-of, and even unique would be welcome replacements.

Notice in the paragraph above I referred to synonyms by mentioning a thesaurus and then used the words “substitutes” and “replacements” rather than using “synonyms” several times over. 

This is the joy of the English Language! We have so many options with so many shades of meaning. 

The other day I started a short story completely unrelated to my drafting of The Most Amazing Museum of Chicago and I couldn’t quite find my way into writing it until I tried it in second person (using the pronoun “you”). Suddenly it landed just right, creating a mood I didn’t even know I wanted. But that word “you” tripped me up a bit. There’s no alternative word in second person, even first person has the variance of I/me. 

That’s my challenge as a writer. What are my options? How do I solve this puzzle so my reader doesn’t dive for the remote. I don’t know yet but I’ll be working on it.

It’s strange, it’s novel, it’s new. Just not unprecedented.

By the way, precedence just means it happened before. It’d be okay to say “nothing like this has ever happened before.”

We have a saying in theatre: less is more. 

Would less use of “unprecedented” be more than I could hope for?

TTFN

* * * * *

My middle grade novel, The Most Amazing Museum of Los Angeles is available through The BookBaby Bookshop at https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-most-amazing-museum-of-los-angeles

Margerumalia – Viewers Like You

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – July 25, 2025

Leah, the youngest girl in The Most Amazing Museum of Los Angeles got her start thanks to PBS.

It began when Debbie was reading a book to our young daughter who started reading the words as well. Had she just memorized her favorite book? Kids are like that, they soak things up like sponges. Debbie pulled out a book that she knew our daughter had never seen and asked her to read it.

She did. Our little sponge had taught herself how to read.

How, you ask? We credit PBS.

All her favorite programs were on PBS, from “Sesame Street” to “Barney” to “Between The Lions” and more. All the groundwork was laid out to help her learn how to read and do basic math. 

When she got tested for Kindergarten, the teacher told us she was already reading at a fourth grade level. We started referring to her as “a smarticle.” 

The character of Leah is also a five year old—”almost six” she tells people—who taught herself how to read. Her adventure in Eveningwhere with teen step-sister, Vanessa, shows how very smart she is.

PBS helped educate our daughter those many years ago. Today, I listen to “The PBS News Hour” podcast every morning on my walks. I also listen to NPR’s “Fresh Air” and “The Treatment” to learn about movies, books, TV shows, and much more.

I’m so disappointed that the funding for these programs is being dropped by the government when they’re so valuable to the American public. 

I’m contributing money to PBS and NPR and I’ll offer you a free ebook copy of MAMLA if you show me your receipt that says you’ve also donated (send it to eric@ericmargerum.com). My ebook is in EPUB format and can be read on Kindle, Apple Books, Nook, and most ebook apps. 

Be sure to black out any credit card numbers, or other important information. I’ll also delete the receipt after I send you the ebook. 

Many PBS and NPR stations award thank-you gifts like tumblers, tote-bags, and hats. If you get one, please use it or wear it with pride and let people know that these programs are made possible by people like you.

TTFN

* * * * *

DONATION SITES: 

www.pbs.org and www.npr.org

Ken Burns, documentary director of “The Civil War,” “Baseball” and “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea” said on PBS: My biggest thing is, I travel around the system all the time. And I meet in big markets and small markets. And you begin to see the way in which, particularly in those small rural markets, the PBS station is really like the public library. It’s one of those important institutions. It may be the only place where people have access to local news, that the local station is going to the city council meeting.

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.

Margerumalia – Anne of Green Gables

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – July 18, 2025

Hey, look at that! I designed a book cover. Pretty good, I think. (Okay maybe it’d be better without the manhole cover.) 

I thought I’d take time this week to recommend a classic book that I ran across when looking through free Apple Audiobook options. In fact, I was listening to it while walking on the path in the photo.

I worked in a bookstore for about three years in L.A. and became familiar with a lot of titles and authors. One we were constantly re-stocking was the Anne of Green Gables collection in the children’s section. My mom had read several of the Little House on the Prairie series to me and my brothers, and I tended to think of the Green Gables books as pretty much the same thing.

They’re not. 

First of all, Green Gables is in Canada. Second, Anne is one of the best characters ever written. She’s is witty, charming, optimistic, dramatic, and verbose! I mean, this gal can talk the ear off a pitcher! 

I was literally laughing out loud while listening to this audiobook. When a passer-by on the path was startled by my guffaw I felt the need to explain to her that I was laughing at an audiobook. I think her expression could be described as tolerant. And she probably labelled me as “odd but not dangerous.”

Kudos to the narrator, Kae Denino, for capturing the essence of Anne’s character and for spouting long paragraphs of Anne’s speeches almost without stopping for breath. 

I’m working on narrating my own book and, believe me, I know what Denino has accomplished here! 

The rest of what makes Anne’s incessant chatter hilarious is that she was “adopted” by two quiet elderly people—a brother and a sister—who are completely taken aback by the child they’ve brought into their home. They were expecting a boy! Anne wins them over, of course, but not without a lot of drama and many what-are-we-going-to-do-with-her moments.

At one point in the story I knew Anne’s words would get her into trouble once again and I kind of thought of skipping ahead. “We’ve already seen this episode,” I thought, but, to the author’s credit, Anne did learn from her mistakes and grew more mature with time. Don’t we all? 

Another compliment to the narrator is that Anne’s pitch and tone at the end of the book reflected a character who had grown up and taken on more adult attitudes. I really believed this was an older version of the same person. Subtle, but solid. 

There’s so much we can learn just by paying attention to someone else’s work, whether it’s a writer, a narrator, or a graphic artist. My design for this newsletter reflects what I learned from someone who designed many of my theatre posters at Carthage College. 

Everyone in your life is a teacher. If you pay attention, you may learn something.

TTFN

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.

Margerumalia – A Spotlight on Betty White

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – July 11, 2025

I stood in line behind Betty White. I was nineteen and she was legendary.

I wanted to say something, but knew it had to be worth saying.

This moment happened in Akron, Ohio, where I was working as an apprentice for The Kenley Players. Kenley also had summer contracts with theatres in Dayton and Columbus. Most of the summer I worked in the box office but I also got to do an occasional load-in or a load-out because it was an eleven show season. One week performances with one day of travel between cities. John Kenley was great about making sure his apprentices were included in free dinner events put on by local restaurants. 

I did this for two summers while I was in college.

Betty White was there both times. 

The first season began with the musical Chicago featuring Alan Ludden, known mainly as the long-running host of “Password.” He played the flamboyant lawyer Billy Flynn, who gave them “the ol’ razzle dazzle” to secure a not-guilty verdict for Roxie Hart. He was good with the role, too, playing just the right balance of manipulation and charm. 

He was also married to Betty White. 

Here’s a charming clip of Betty White flirting with Allen Ludden the first time she appeared on “Password” as one of the celebrities. https://tvline.com/news/betty-white-allen-ludden-password-romance-974130

In many of my celebrity meet-ups I only thought of the right thing to say five minutes afterwards, but this time I think I nailed it. After complimenting her work on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” I asked her whether she preferred performing on stage or for the camera. 

She told me that a sitcom like MTM was the best of both worlds. They got to perform in front of a live audience as well as playing for the camera. She proved that a few years later when she co-starred in seven seasons of “The Golden Girls.” Living her best life even after the death of her beloved husband. 

My second year with The Kenley Players I was stationed in Dayton where I spent a lot of time with the stagehands in addition to working in the box office. That was the year Betty White was the star in “Hello, Dolly!” and I played a big role in letting her shine. 

I was assigned to sit in the fly rails for that show, where a huge dimmer board controlled all the lights of the production. The union man, an Old Pro that I looked up to, operated most of the dimmers but in the days before computer-operated boards sometimes three or four hands were needed. I took great pride in pushing the sliders to just the right levels at the right time. 

When there were lighting problems in Akron and the Old Pro was needed there, he told me that I knew how to do it all and that another union guy would be brought in to be my assistant. I was in charge, he told me, mounting his Harley to zip out to Akron.

My new assignment included the moment in the title song when Betty White appeared at the top of the stairs to be serenaded by the waiters in the restaurant. The only part of that entire show that I remember was timing the Betty White Special to the music after the cue from the stage manager. (We could see the top of the stairs but the SM couldn’t.) I’m proud to say the Betty White Special was perfect every time. 

Next time you watch a movie, a TV show, or live theatre, take a moment to appreciate the many names of people behind the scenes who really, really care about getting it right every time. 

I’ve been a fan of Betty White to this day.

TTFN

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.

Margerumalia – Critter Update

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – July 4, 2025

Our world of wild animals out the window just widened! 

[Don’t you just love a large load of alliteration?]

We’d given up on Tabitha bringing around kittens again this year. Since the day she showed up non-pregnant on our back deck, we’ve been counting the days when we’d get to see another brood. There were four kittens last year. 

A month went by and we told each other that little creatures at the bottom of the food chain don’t stand much chance in the wild. And when a fox toured our deck, sniffing for prey, turning up his nose at the bowl of cat food, and trotting around like he owned the place, we had to accept the circle-of-life nature of…well…Nature.

Almost two months to the day of Tabby’s un-pregnancy, Debbie spied a little critter at the lip of our neighbor’s backyard (the edge of the ravine) and saw Tabitha run and herd it back into the brush. A kitten. 

Were there others in the litter who got eaten or didn’t survive? We don’t know, but Tabitha’s pregnancy belly was much smaller than last year, so maybe the kitten count was low. We’ve only seen the one.

Since then, they’ve been hanging out in our neighbor’s yard, where Mama and her kitten nurse, play, and hide under the small deck. The little tyke isn’t ready for solid food yet, but Tabby shows up for her bowl of cat food every morning.

Guess who else is stopping by? Yep, Rocki’s brood, who I refer to as The Three Stooges. Raccoons decide at an early age that it’s every man for himself and their meals are hard-scrabble contests that result in flying pieces of kibble getting caught between the boards. They don’t hit each other in the face like their human namesakes, but they use their hefty behinds to butt each other aside and grab the food like a bunch of bumper cars at a drive-thru.

When I open the sliding glass door they scramble off the deck like a carload of circus clowns. Between their slapstick comedy and the kitten’s high flying leaps through the grasses, we have the best entertainment just outside our windows. 

Debbie got a great evening shot of the kitten walking under the living room window. I think he’s imagining himself sneaking up behind an unsuspecting rodent. Not that he’s gonna find a mouse small enough to trap between his little pads, but then he’s only practicing, and exercising his instincts.

I don’t know that he’s a him, actually. I read that tabbies are about 50/50. Toss of the little stripedy little coin, I guess.

TTFN

* * * * *

A SECOND KITTEN: Stop the presses! [I always wanted to say that.]

A day after I wrote the Margerumalia above, an orange tabby emerged from under our neighbors deck. This one’s smaller than the other and is an orange tabby, just as adorable as the first but not as bold.

Here’s Debbie’s best shot of the O.T. so far:

Keep your fingers crossed that we can find homes for these little ones. And that we can cage a very cagey Mama Cat and get her spayed. [I snuck in some more alliteration  there. Did you see that? Yeah, I figured you would.]

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.

Margerumalia – Another Opening, Another Show

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – June 27, 2025

By the time you read this it’ll be opening night of our Civic Theatre Short Play Festival. I’ve directed one of the plays and I’m looking forward to seeing how it’s received.  

Last year I directed a ten minute play with three cows, this year I’m directing a ten minute play featuring three bags of dog food and a Roomba. 

Spoiler alert, Woofy has died. 

The bags of dog food are sitting in the pantry contemplating their inevitable end. The Roomba has no lines, it just moves endlessly around the stage. It’s an absurdist comedy called “Best Before” by Judson Wright.

Like “Waiting for Godot,” perhaps the most well-known example of absurdism, “Best Before” has some comic banter as well as some existential suffering, but what really touches me in this play is the final sentiment: you mattered.

I do feel that everyone matters and that our ability to empathize is one of the greatest features of humanity. It wounds me deeply when I see people intentionally stomp all over that gift in an effort to enrich themselves or show off their ability to be a winner. What is it to win when so much is lost?

I’m not talking about the mistakes we all make, a failure to see someone else’s pain, or the moments of weakness that cause us to lash out. Those can be humbling when we realize what we’ve done and our better angels remind us to do better.

Empathy and love are mighty forces and they breed even more empathy and more love. My wife and I continue to talk about our daughter’s wedding last month and the incredible “village” of friends and family who wrapped their love around two people, putting all of their effort into making it a memorable celebration that they pulled off without a hitch. Of course it helped that most of them were theatre people who knew how to pull off a production, but even the DJ and the photographer said it was one of their favorite experiences. You know the feelings were shining through.

Empathy is also the realm of the artist. Some of the most moving songs are written by artists who observed someone else’s pain or their joy. The greatest actors have the ability to move you by bringing genuine feeling to their roles. Photographers excel at capturing poignant visions of the world around you. The best story tellers draw you into the world of their stories and your range of experience grows as you place yourself in the shoes of those characters. 

I encourage you to support the arts in a time when funds are drying up and empathy is at a low ebb. Go to the library. Go to an art gallery. Go to a play…

Be great. You matter.

TTFN

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.

Margerumalia – My Familect

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – June 20, 2025

PHOTO CREDIT: http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl

Grammar Girl has been in my podcast feed for about a dozen years and I always learn something new and interesting from her. She feels like a friend that lives in my pocket just to tell me stuff about the English Language.

Last week she interviewed an expert on gestures and how they play a role in communication, including differences among cultures. Italians, for example, tend to gesture from the shoulder all the way down the arm, using plenty of space in front of them and to the sides. Germans, on the other hand [no pun intended], use their arms from the elbows when they talk, and their gestures are just to the front.

As a result, we tend to think that Italians use more gestures while Germans use less. Turns out that their gesture count was the same, but the style of gesture gives the impression of more. 

Mignon Fogarty, the actual name of Grammar Girl, also has a unique segment she calls the “familect.” That’s a portmanteau—or mash-up—of “family” and “dialect” indicating a term that your family understands but others would not. 

My younger brother created such a familect when he was learning to talk, enthusiastically shouting “wrench ryes” when Mom pulled the french fries out of the oven. We fondly called them wrench ryes for years afterwards. 

My daughter was the source of what I’ll call a familect adjacent story. 

She was in the fourth grade and had joined the Spell Bowl team—different from a spelling bee because every member contributes to the success of the team. 

One day when I came home from work, she was sitting at the kitchen counter going over her list of words while Debbie prepared dinner. One word was really stumping her: bureaucracy.

I’d picked up many different techniques for memorization so I studied the letters and came up with this sentence: Big Ugly Red Elephants Are Under Cars, Reading And Cooking Yams. Our daughter was thrilled, Debbie told me to write it down before I forget, and I was the hero of the moment! 

Fast forward several months to an elementary school gym where about twenty Spell Bowl teams were competing for the regional championship. Each round, another set of students sat with their proctors at desks spread across the gym floor and when the speaker carefully announced each word, the students wrote it on a piece of paper in front of them. The proctors confirmed each correct word and points were added to the team’s score. Six one-point words, and one two-point bonus word.

When it was our daughter’s turn, the bonus word was—I kid you not—bureaucracy. 

She spun around in her chair and spied us in the bleachers on the other side of the gym. Her expression said “I GOT this!” Her proctor quickly instructed her to face front as my wife and I grinned and quietly recited my sentence: Big Ugly Red Elephants Are Under Cars, Reading And Cooking Yams.

The team didn’t win a trophy, but our daughter got a perfect score on all her words and practically knocked us down with hugs afterwards. 

We went out for ice cream to celebrate.

TTFN

* * * * *

My middle grade novel, The Most Amazing Museum of Los Angeles, is available through The BookBaby Bookshop at https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-most-amazing-museum-of-los-angeles

Margerumalia – Stories From The Professor

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – June 13, 2025

It’s kind of incredible for me to imagine that this picture of my father was taken when he was younger than I am now. He was almost ninety when he died, so I still have a ways to go, but this picture of him is solidly placed in my memory as “Dad.” 

Dad, whose work as a Professor of Chemistry took the family on two sabbaticals in Europe. Dad, who planned camping trips and canoe trips, who played tennis and squash, who liked listening to jazz, who had season tickets to Big Ten football games. Dad, who was quick to pull out a pen and write on a napkin when we had math or science questions at the dinner table. 

Dad, the teller of stories!

Mom read us books as we travelled cross country and she was very much a part of the hiking, tennis, music, sports, and wanderlust, but when we found our campsite and built the campfire, Dad had a story to tell. 

Dad and his brothers grew up in a small town outside of St. Louis, now part of the greater metropolis, and when he was a teenager he got a summer job with the Parks & Recreation Department that included, among other things, telling stories to the younger kids. I imagine them gathered beneath a shady elm tree to stay out of the sun in the hot, humid Missouri afternoons.

He couldn’t remember the content of those stories. Like improvisation, you’re only in the moment, following your imagination, following your impulses.

I later learned that this was my preferred approach to writing stories, the “pantser” approach (from “flying by the seat of my pants”). I think my improv training played into this approach, but with Dad it was instinctual. 

He got ideas from people around him or the landscape or the animals. When my younger brother was avid about collecting rocks and we were traveling west, Dad invented a character who was nicknamed Rock Hound because he, too, had a huge interest in rocks, and his tracking skills were developed from that fascination.

Fast forward about twenty-five years to when I was teaching Theatre at Carthage College.

My wife and I still talk about the lecture Dad gave when he offered to tell the chemistry students about his latest research. There were about a dozen students and a couple faculty, so we sat in on the lecture, too. 

Neither of us can remember the content of his talk, most of the science was over our heads, but we still recall that he was telling a story. He presented the question that the research team wanted to solve, told about the experiments they created to find the answers, described the hurdles they encountered along the way, and wrapped it all up with what they discovered. 

Classic story structure! Short of ending it with “…and they all lived happily ever after.” 

Thanks, Dad, for raising me with stories to show how it’s done. 

Fast forward another twenty years.

Dad was in Memory Care when I was writing MAMLA and I would spend three days a week with him while Mom was getting dialysis all afternoon. He’d read the newspaper while I wrote the latest adventure of the Shafer Family. One time he asked me what I was writing so I read him the passage where Ryan and Maria were escaping the dire wolves and he said he it was very exciting. 

That memory makes me smile. Approval from the teller of tales.

TTFN

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.

Margerumalia – Out For A Spin

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – June 6, 2025

PHOTO CREDIT: http://www.swient.com/how-to-recognize-vertigo-in-children

I went to see my doctor to tell her I had vertigo. She said it was all in my head. [Rim-shot.] 

I always wanted to try stand-up comedy, but could never come up with any good material. Having seen the recent trend toward life-experience-as-stand-up I thought I might have something. 

I do. Or I did. I had vertigo.

Do you remember going on a ride at the playground where the whole point is to enjoy the dizzy? Where the spin is the fun? Vertigo feels like that, only it’s not intentional, nor fun.

About 3 AM I woke up to a shout. It was me. I stood up from the bed and the entire room was doing that spinning thing. I fell back into bed. Which didn’t help. At all.

I reverted to the earliest skills of childhood and grabbed onto furniture to toddle my way to the bathroom. I collapsed in front of the porcelain god and waited for the inevitable upheaval. It didn’t come.

I’ve learned a thing or two about my body over the years, and one is that it prepares for the old heave-ho with a few deep breaths, much like a pearl diver getting ready for the big the plunge. That night I spent over thirty minutes clutching onto the toilet bowl while hyperventilating. 

Let me be clear. There were two of us there in the middle of that whirlpool. Me, hugging the bowl. And my body, preparing for that dive.

For. Thirty. Minutes. 

I know because I wear my Apple Watch to bed so I can keep track of my sleep statistics. Turns out that Apple doesn’t clock vertigo. 

Last year I was teaching high school students how to fall safely on stage so they could do it over and over again in performances without getting hurt. THAT was when Siri checked in on me and offered to call 911. During a case of the spins? Not so much.

It was time. I needed help. I called out for my wife.

We sleep in separate bedrooms. I snore. She tosses and turns. We learned long ago that if we wanted to stay together we were going to have to split up. At night.  

I’d like to be able to say I called her name with a robust voice like Tarzan summoning Jane in the jungle. Instead I was more like a toad in the pond. 

“Debbie!” I croaked. “Come here, I need you.” 

I’m sure Alexander Graham Bell summoned Watson with much more panache on the world’s first phone call. 

Debbie, bless her heart, has baby monitor hearing and was at my bathroom door in three seconds flat. Well, I was flat. She was standing there asking me what was wrong, and should she call for an ambulance. 

Why did I do the stereotypical guy thing and say she didn’t need to call the ambulance? I mean, did I call out so she could wake up and enjoy the phenomenon of my total disorientation?

After ten more minutes of hyperventilation and I finally agreed to the ER Express. 

Somehow, even amidst the mind-storm of staggering to the bathroom, I had managed to slip into some sweat pants. Which was handy because one wants to be fully clothed when visitors come to call. I also dragged myself into the hall so the EMT’s didn’t need to extract me from the vomitorium.

In the ER they gave me the vertigo diagnosis, or labyrinthitis. Hey! Perfect for a guy who just released a middle grade novel about a family that has to find their way out of a museum through a maze! …or labyrinth.

I’ve got pills now, because, you know, the world revolves around pharmaceuticals. (Had enough with the revolving metaphors? Me, too.) At least the pills dull the nausea and the rotation sensation. (That was the last one, I promise.)

And I’ve had an MRI. Who knew a brain could be clinically described as “grossly unremarkable”? 

That phrase sounds like it should be from a play by Oscar Wilde: “She lacked poise, she lacked depth, she had a distinct paucity of charm, wit, and acumen. She was, in fact, grossly unremarkable.” 

The acupuncturist is the only doctor who has helped me get better. I hate needles, but that’s another story.

TTFN

* * * * *

My middle grade novel, The Most Amazing Museum of Los Angeles, is available through The BookBaby Bookshop at https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-most-amazing-museum-of-los-angeles

Margerumalia – My Brush With Fame

Eric Margerum

Newsletter – May 30, 2025

PHOTO CREDIT: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/obituaries/george-wendt-cheers-dies-76-rcna208080

“Norm!” everyone yelled when George Wendt walked into the bar. We raised our beer mugs in tribute to his passing this past week.

I started watching “Cheers” on TV the first year it came out. The show had an endearing theme song and it centered around a group of people who were a little quirky and enjoyed a good chat. I felt like I knew them immediately.

I almost did.

I was working as an assistant manager at Crown Books in Studio City when one of our regular customers—not unlike the regulars on “Cheers”—came into the store and asked me if I’d heard the news about the actor playing Coach. He had died.

Yes, I assured him, it was on every channel. The befuddled but sweet character was a favorite who was nominated for three Emmys over three years. I really liked that guy. 

“Did you know they’re planning to replace him?” 

“Really? That’d be hard to do. I don’t know if the audience would accept a different Coach.”

“They’re not gonna have another Coach,” Regular Customer told me. “They’re going to replace him with one of his ball players who is exactly like him, only younger.” 

“That’s a great idea!” 

“The character’s name is Woody. And he’s your age.” 

That’s the thing about working in LA, in a place called Studio City, the information orchard was always ripe for the picking, and this was within arm’s reach. RC was eying me now, waiting for my next thought. 

“Have they cast him yet?” 

“Not yet. You should call your agent as soon as you can and get that audition. You’re perfect for it.” 

Not to say that I was dim-witted like Coach, but that I could play Woody easily.

When my agent took my call she admitted she was looking at me and one other client to submit. They would only let her choose one. I assured her that I was the one for the job and that I knew the series well, and please, please, please give me a shot. 

Okay, maybe I only said please once, but I got the chance to audition! 

I went to the casting agent’s office off Sunset Boulevard near the Hollywood Freeway and got to read the sides. Those are the script pages they give you for the audition. It featured Woody in a one-sided phone conversation where he clearly didn’t understand what the other person was saying. 

Did I ace it? I don’t know, I was pretty nervous and bubbling with adrenaline. They told my agent I did a good job, so that was nice to hear. 

And then they hired some guy named Woody to play the role of Woody. C’mon, people, you don’t have to take the script literally!

I continued watching the series after that and Woody Harrelson hit the mark on every show. Even though I wanted to, I couldn’t fault his performances. 

I kept watching “Cheers” all the way to the last episode and often thought about how my life would have been different. The closest I got was doing a play with one of the semi-regulars who hung out at the bar with Norm and Cliff.

I could’ve been friends with those guys. And they would’ve known my name.

TTFN

* * * * *

If you received this email because it was forwarded to you by a subscriber, welcome. You can subscribe as well by following the link on my website: ericmargerum.com. A free story awaits you there.