Seeking Normal

Every morning, I open the front door at sunrise and stand there for a few minutes looking at the world. The sky is still blue, the trees and grass green, the air heavy with morning dew and pollen. It's the same as always.

But it isn't, and as the day progresses, the quiet of self-isolation becomes jarring. It's not supposed to be like this. There are supposed to be people here. There are supposed to be people in their driveways working on their cars, the kids across the street shooting hoops, cars rolling by on their way to work or shopping or wherever. Planes are supposed to be overhead, making the turn from LAX off to places all over the world. But they're not, and while all of that will someday return in some form, it's going to be a long process. You know all of this, and I know the anxiety that fills my day every day is what you're feeling, too.

All of this is to say that columns talking about things like "radio's role" and "what radio can do" and speculation about the future leave me cold right now, because my mind isn't there, and neither is yours. We're thinking about our own lives, our own jobs, our own health, our own uncertainty. The bigger picture involves our families and our survival. And through it all, if we still have jobs, even if we've had our pay and hours cut and we don't know what's coming next, we try to plow through and make it to tomorrow, one day at a time.

But this is a radio-oriented column. I'm not going to give you advice on what to do on the air, because you know the usual answers: accurate information, companionship, all of that. I can only speak for myself in saying that the last thing I'm turning on right now is talk radio, because while I'm glad it's covering the news, good and bad, about the pandemic, and I'm sure the ratings will spike because of it, I... just can't. I'm overloaded, and I surely don't need to hear political talkers passing along misinformation. I need something else to help me just get to the end of the day. Sports radio helps, but only a little; honestly, the NFL Draft as 24/7 topic isn't doing much for me, and I'm a football fan. I'm looking for something that may not even be possible right now, something that takes my mind away from what's right in front of me. Music isn't even doing that too well right now. I want the audio equivalent of jigsaw puzzles, something that requires just enough concentration to distract but is not remotely related to COVID-19. I want a white noise machine, but with words. I want comfort food that talks. I want funny, but I don't know that anyone can really pull that off, because I also don't want shows to pretend that things are normal. Honestly, I don't know WHAT I want, but I know that an endless diet of coronavirus talk is not helping me cope. Maybe radio companies should hire mental health experts to guide programming right now.

In the meantime, I'll probably toil in silence, taking a few minutes from time to time to look outside and imagine what it'll be like when the people are back and the economy is back and things are... normal. Maybe that's what I'm looking for. Can "normal" be a radio format? Because I'd listen.

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Whatever you're doing on the air right now, you'll continue to find all kinds of topics you might not have seen elsewhere, coronavirus and others, at Talk Topics, the show prep column at All Access News-Talk-Sports, which you can find by clicking here and/or following the Talk Topics Twitter feed at @talktopics with every story individually linked to the appropriate item.

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I'll be doing my best to keep the column relevant and interesting while we deal with the pandemic. ("Relevant and interesting?" Why would I start now?) Can't guarantee it'll be about radio or even good, but I'll keep punching. Gotta work out frustrations one way or another.

Perry Michael Simon
Vice President/Editor, News-Talk-Sports and Podcast
AllAccess.com
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