All In My Head

I'm thinking of a radio advertisement. I heard it years ago, many years ago – we're talking 1973 or so. I don't remember what the ad was for, just the repeated catch-phrase that echoed eerily through a night-shrouded country bedroom, with dogs ruh-ruh-ruffing somewhere off in the distance, and crickets chirping just beyond the open window. "Did they die for us?"

Who? Did who die? I'm trying to remember it. It was spoken by a group of children – a chorus of nine- and ten-year olds. "Did they die for us?" Then a somber baritone announcer mumbled something no doubt poignant and sobering. Followed by the children asking once more, "did they die for us?"

That's all I have. No clues that will suddenly uncloak the answer the longer I ponder. Just the interesting notion of who "they" might be. The ones that apparently died. And made a group of children curious as to whom "they" kicked off for.

Was it about veterans? When I think sometimes of a radio murmuring in the dark somewhere next to my bed, I remember one particular veteran: my dad. There's no face connected to this particular memory of him – just the blackness of a dark bedroom, pierced by a tiny, glowing orange point of light. A cigarette flaring. Intensifying to a neon yellow ever briefly, then simmering down to a flicker of amber. A falling star in an empty night. He smoked in bed. Never fell asleep mid-cig. He was either very careful or extremely lucky.

Was it rabbits that died? The bunnies who bought the farm, so that the mothers of this group of kids could find out whether a nose-picking little radio actor was on the way? Those were the 70s, afterall. There were no little gray "+" signs that turned blue. No ultrasound photographs. The "rabbit test" involved the death of Bugs, so that Mom could find out if your new little brother was in the oven. In that case, kids, yeah – they died for you. The real question is, were you worth it?

Another memory I connect to a puttering little night stand radio is announcer Vin Scully ("Vinnnz Gully" as he himself pronounced it) fading in and out with "so that's the inneen, as thuh Daahhjers take a pawbuball to zekkun" (the Dodgers take a pop-up ball to second) and thah remines me, faahnz, how all other lunchmeats come in zekkun to Fahhmer Jahhnz lunchmeat..."

I could listen to this guy talk all night, about damn near anything. An Ell-Lay raydeeo dude fighting his New Yawka accent like a mailman swatting a pitbull with the Publishers' Clearinghouse sweepstakes.

"An I godda pizzed-off bumble-bee in my trowzers, stingin' my azzzz, fanz, an boy duz it hurrrrt. Which remines me how all the other weener brands STING YOU IN THE AZZ at the subermarket cheggout lines. Unlike the deee-lishuss, wallet-friendly priced weenerz frum Fahhmer Jahhhn..."

I'd get up at 1:30 in the morning for a sandwich, to get that mean Fahhmer Jahhn bologna monkey off my back. Yes, I was a fat kid, until the few stations whose signals reached over the mountains to our house stopped carrying Dodger games – or at least just broadcast day games, when I was at school.

I'll never forget Scully translate the drama of a sudden homerun, to an audience that couldn't actually see the action. "Heeerrre's the pitch... An it's wayback... waaaayyback... and kiss it g'bye!!" I can hear it in my head, as clear as any 50,000 watt signal drifting north over the hills on a night sky crowded with thunderheads.

Scully announced Dodger games on the radio almost since Marconi invented the damn thing. I think Al Michaels first got work simply because his voice was a sound-alike to Scully's. Since the Dodgers themselves couldn't draw much of a radio audience by actually winning a game on a regular basis, they must have figured they'd better stick to SOMETHING that worked. Screw the game.

I just remembered that the foreboding "Did they die for us" commercial happened during a Dodger game broadcast. Maybe it referred to the Dodgers themselves. Or maybe just the ratings of their radio games.

Dodgers don't really die. They pop up to second.