Not That You Asked (9780307822215) Page 30

  By the time I was ready to go to bed, I realized I’d eaten too much for dinner. I’d like to review all eight camera angles of me at dinner last night to see if I can determine exactly where I went wrong. Next time we have it, I think I’d reverse my decision to have another helping of linguine with white clam sauce and I know darn well I’d overrule my call for more ice cream.

  There are hundreds of decisions I’ve made that I’d like to see again:

  —It would be interesting to replay the conversation Margie and I had when we decided to live in Connecticut instead of New York or California.

  —The details of how we ended up with three cars for two people are vague to me. I’d like to see that again.

  —If there had been cameras in the store where I bought the terrible-looking suit that doesn’t fit me, I’d like to look carefully at those pictures to determine whether the salesman was out of bounds.

  To be given a second chance, after reviewing the evidence and the facts, would change all our lives, I suspect three out of every ten important decisions I make would turn out to have been wrong if it were possible to go back over them and spend some time looking at every aspect of the problem.

  The NFL owners are meeting in Phoenix, and the question of instant replay is on their agenda. They’re talking about eliminating the rule that calls for it. I can’t imagine why.

  The instant replay has been a great satisfaction to both players and fans. They all get a better deal. I should think that even the officials would like it because they’ve come off looking good. The instant-replay feature was invoked 490 times in 210 football games and the officials were found to have been wrong only fifty-seven times. In other words, they were right almost 90 percent of the time. We should all have such a good right/wrong average in the decisions we make.

  One objection NFL owners have is that it takes the officials in the booth too long to make their decision. That’s true, but it takes advertisers too long to sell their stuff in the commercials too, yet the owners don’t complain about that.

  Instead of eliminating instant replay from one sport, it should be spread to all sports where television cameras are present. Anytime you watch a baseball game, you see two or three bad calls a game. Some are so obvious that even the home-team rooting announcers can spot a bad call that went in favor of their team. The World Series would be improved with instant replay.

  Baseball and I should both have instant replay so we could review what has just happened and correct our mistakes.

  Mr. Rooney Goes to Church

  My old school classmate Howard Hageman has done very well in religion and he was the guest preacher at the beautiful little New England church in our tiny upstate New York town. I liked Howard in school and I was curious about how he did it, so I went to church.

  When I knew Howard best, he was manager of our undefeated high school football team. He went to Harvard and subsequently became president of the New Brunswick Theological Seminary.

  There were thirty-nine people in church Sunday morning, a pretty good crowd. The interior of the church is perfect. It is absolutely plain, about sixty feet across and eighty feet long, painted a kind of Williamsburg off-white. There are twelve rows of pews, divided by a center aisle. The minister stands at a simple mahogany lectern, framed by two white, fluted columns that go from the floor to the roof.

  Howard greeted the congregation and then, before asking the members to pray, and realizing some of the people had come a distance to hear him, said that if anyone had to go to the bathroom after the service, they could do it at the Palmer House Café just up the street.

  The Palmer House is one of the best things that ever happened to our town. It’s a serious little restaurant that has even arranged to get the Sunday papers so we no longer have to drive twelve miles for them. Sunday morning I can pick up four fresh-baked cinnamon Danish and The New York Times by eight o’clock.

  When the restaurant opened two years ago, it was having trouble getting a liquor license because it was less than the two hundred-foot state-mandated distance from the church.

  The Palmer House has a wine license now and it sounds as though it has arrived at some quid pro quo with the church: The people who pray can go to the bathroom at the restaurant and the restaurant can have a wine license only 198 feet from the last pew.

  Howard has gained a lot of weight but he has gained a lot of presence too. He’s no Jimmy Swaggart, but he knows how to do it. He began by speaking to us about the Lord and was very professional with his change of pace and change of volume. He would speak softly for a minute and then, with a dramatic gesture, turn up the volume and shout at us. He was good and never at a loss for words.

  The congregation was good too. Everyone in it but me knew when to stand and when to sit down. I was brought up a Presbyterian but had forgotten that they don’t kneel. Howard said he was Dutch Reformed but later at lunch when I asked him to explain the difference, he was enjoying his chicken salad and deflected the question.

  During prayers, Howard called on the Lord to end all wars, heal the sick, console the grieving and also asked Him to “give His blessing to this country and this land.” I’ll be interested to see what happens. The theme of Howard’s sermon posed the question of whether people are happier now than they were two hundred years ago when our small town was founded. He said that just because we have all these “instruments of pleasure” doesn’t mean we’re happier.

  “Pleasure,” Howard said, “is doing what we like to do.” There was a clear implication in his sermon that this could lead us to what he called “the hell of fire.” Being a pleasure seeker myself, I was uneasy.

  When Howard and I were in the academy together, we attended chapel every morning and sang four or five songs, including one hymn. I love those hymns I learned and I thought Howard was letting me down until the last one he chose.

  It was one called “Love Divine.” It starts: “Love’s divine all love’s excelling.” My favorite line is: “Take away our bent to sinning alpha and omega be.” I never knew what it meant but it was great to sing.

  Howard was tough on us sinners, and I was pleased to note at lunch that Howard himself is mortal, when he smoked ten instruments of pleasure in a little more than an hour.

  My Guest, Mr. Gorbachev

  Next time Mikhail Gorbachev of the Soviet Union comes to the United States, I’d like to show him around. A visit here would be a college education for him and I’m not sure he’d want to go back.

  It would be fun to show Gorbachev around. I think a visit here would change any Russian’s attitude toward the United States. We’ll never do it by arguing with them. Most Russians are better informed about communism than the average American is about democracy and capitalism, but if every Soviet citizen spent just one day in the United States, it would be more effective than all the talking that has ever been done.

  I’d like to have Mr. Gorbachev as my guest if he comes here. He seems like a pretty good guy.

  First thing I’d do is I’d bring him home. I’d put him in Ellen’s old room next to the bathroom and tell him he’s welcome to anything he wants in the refrigerator in case he feels like a beer or some cheese between meals. We’re a little short on borscht but the average American refrigerator would look pretty good to a Russian from what I’ve seen of food in the Soviet Union.

  After getting Gorbachev settled, I’d suggest we take a drive around our small town in Connecticut.

  “You want to drive?” I’d say to Gorbachev. I figure he might enjoy that because, as an important official, he always gets taken in a chauffeur-driven limousine. He’d probably love to get his hands on an American car, anyway.

  Gorbachev and I would drop in to visit with friends who live in houses with three rooms per person instead of three persons per room the way they do in the Soviet Union.

  I’d take him over to the supermarket and show him the shelves full of loaves of bread, the refrigerated cabinets full of milk, cream, butter and eggs,
and no lines anywhere but at the checkout counter.

  After the supermarket, we’d head for the fancy new mall. I hate it myself but it would surely impress a Russian.

  If there was time, I’d take him over to the Giants’ training camp to watch practice.

  That night we’d have dinner, watch television, argue until eleven and go to bed after the late news.

  Next morning we’d give Gorbachev fresh-squeezed orange juice, bacon and eggs, and pancakes with maple syrup, just as if that’s what we ate every morning for breakfast. The fact is, of course, I grab a piece of toast and a cup of coffee, but he doesn’t have to know that.

  The next morning we’d drive into New York City. We’d go at rush hour to make sure we got trapped in a traffic jam. The Soviet president isn’t going to believe there are that many cars in the whole world.

  Cars are hard to buy in the Soviet Union. One of President Reagan’s favorite jokes was about a Russian trying to buy a new car.

  He goes to the official government car dealer, puts his money down and the dealer says he can deliver the car in ten years.

  “Morning or afternoon?” the man asks.

  “In ten years,” the dealer says, “what’s the difference?”

  “Because,” the man says, “the plumber’s coming in the morning.”

  In New York we’d park the car and go over to Crazy Eddie or 47 St. Photo to look at electronic gadgets, television sets, kitchen appliances and computers. We’ll walk or take a cab. I wouldn’t let Gorbachev on the subway because the subways are better, cleaner and safer in Moscow. I don’t want him to get one up on me.

  For lunch, we’ll go to the Russian Tea Room, a fancy restaurant near Carnegie Hall that specializes in celebrities and pretends to be Russian. We’ll see what Gorbachev thinks of an American restaurant that thinks it’s Russian.

  This is only twenty-four hours but I’ll bet I’m beginning to get to Gorbachev already and I haven’t even taken him to the Empire State Building, Texas, Maine, California or Disney World.

  The Gentle Rain from Heaven

  It’s raining. It’s a gentle, steady rain. I hear it on the roof, see it running down the windowpanes. The grass out there obviously loves it. The garden by the side of the house is gulping it down.

  Call it perverse if you wish, but I love a rainy day.

  This is no recent love affair for me. I remember liking a rainy day when I was a child. I think I know why, too. When it’s raining, it cuts down on the number of options you have for action that day. There are things you know won’t be possible to do so you don’t worry about them.

  A rainy day is special. On a normal day, we are all faced with so many things we ought to do that we go through it with the vague, gnawing feeling that we’re leaving a lot of things undone. On a rainy day, we can’t mow the lawn, go swimming, play golf or tennis, have a picnic or cook out. Everything, except staying dry, is simpler.

  We needn’t leave the house at all on a rainy day if it’s a Saturday or Sunday. All inaction is excused by the unavoidable circumstance of weather. “It’s raining.” I even recall my mother saying she wasn’t going to do wash because it was raining and she wouldn’t be able to hang it out in the backyard to dry. Many of you may have thought that even though Adam and Eve had no clothes, they had a washing machine and a dryer, but that is not true.

  A sunny, bright day doesn’t call itself to your attention the same way a rainy one does. You appreciate life more on a rainy day. A day with the sun out is an average day. You don’t inspect it much. Even the weather reports on radio and television are dull when the sun is shining.

  People think better on rainy days. This is not a scientific observation but I’d be willing to bet it’s true. The sound of the patter of water coming down in equally spaced drops on everything drowns out distracting noises and it’s easier to concentrate. Sun, on the other hand, is bad for the brain. Left out in it long enough, the brain becomes frazzled and inoperative. I’ll bet Albert Einstein never got a sunburn.

  Even though I could stay inside all day today, I know I won’t. Just as soon as I finish this, I’m going to lace up my old shoes with the waterproofing on them, put on my yellow slicker that really sheds water and find some excuse for going out in the rain.

  One of the good things about rain is the fun to be had trying to stay dry. It’s a game, and people like it even though they seldom win it. The best raingear usually leaves you wet somewhere. If everything else works, the drips run up your sleeve when you lift your arm, or your headgear is less than perfect and the rain finds its way down your neck. The space between the bottom of your raincoat and the tops of your shoes is vulnerable too.

  While I like to go out in the rain properly dressed, there is still some work to be done on rainwear. An umbrella is great fun in a good rain. It doesn’t really keep you dry but having the rain spatter overhead without actually hitting you gives the illusion that you’re defeating the weather. Umbrellas are efficient from the top of the head to somewhere around the waistline, but from there down umbrellas don’t help at all. Also, while umbrellas are good when rain is coming straight down, rain is so often accompanied by high winds that drive it in a slanting direction that umbrellas are of limited value in the average rain.

  Cars have been made remarkably impervious to rain. I’m always surprised that you don’t get wet at all driving a car in a rainstorm. I wish they’d make truck-size windshield wipers for cars that went straight back and forth across the windshield instead of wiping in that half-moon shape. I imagine they’ll get to that because the half-moon shape leaves too much of the windshield unwiped.

  There now. That’s done—I can go out and play in the rain.

  Many thanks to Jane Bradford for all her good help

  Also by Andrew A. Rooney:

  Word for Word 1986

  Pieces of My Mind 1984

  And More by Andy Rooney 1982

  A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney 1981

  The Fortunes of War 1962

  Conqueror’s Peace (with Bud Hutton) 1946

  The Story of The Stars and Stripes (with Bud Hutton) 1946

  Air Gunner (with Bud Hutton) 1944

  About the Author

  Andy Rooney, known as “Andrew” to good friends, spent the first fifty years of his career trying to attract attention to his writing and the last ten years of his career trying to avoid the attention he’s attracted from his commentaries on 60 Minutes.

  Drafted at the end of his third year at Colgate University, Rooney spent three army years as a reporter for The Stars and Stripes. He flew on the first U.S. bombing raid over Germany and, after the Normandy invasion, traveled with the First Army across France and Germany. “For those who don’t get killed or wounded,” he says, “war is a great experience.” He later wrote three books with his friend Bud Hutton about World War II. In 1962 he wrote The Fortunes of War, a History Book Club selection.

  That same year he began his work as a writer and producer of television essays. Narrated by Harry Reasoner, these essays won four Emmy Awards and a Peabody Award, and on six occasions, they were voted best-written by the Writers Guild of America.

  His 1971 Essay on War was broadcast on public television’s The Great American Dream Machine. It was followed by documentary hours at CBS News such as Mr. Rooney Goes to Washington and Mr. Rooney Goes to Work.

  Today Andy Rooney is perhaps best known for his weekly cantankerous essays on 60 Minutes. Rooney, who was one of the original writers and producers for the show, which began in 1968, has been on the air since 1978.

  Since 1981 he has written four collections of essays: A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney; And More by Andy Rooney; Pieces of My Mind; and Word for Word. His syndicated column appears three times a week in 265 newspapers.

 

 

  From.Net