“I like to be in America
OK by me in America
Ev’rything free in America
For a small fee in America”
Today, in England, and without even paying that small fee, I can live my life as if I was in Boston, Milwaukee or Los Angeles.
I can access live American TV, the New York Times is just a click away, and thanks to my iPhone, I can drive along the M4 surrounded by the urban sprawl of West London, listening live to KTYD-FM in Santa Barbara and imagine I am driving the Pacific Highway, just like Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate.
In 2011, we are closer than ever to being the 51st State, if only in the cultural sense of interaction and accessibility.
To a boy (well, this boy) growing up in a 1960s England that was just beginning to finally shake off the exhaustion of post war rationing, and starting to come to terms with the loss of Empire, the United States of America might as well have been somewhere a million light years away in another solar system.
America was the land of plenty, of excess, where there was space, room to breathe and a burning optimism for the future.
But nobody hopped on a plane to the States. There were no holidays in Florida, no weekend getaways to New York.
America!
In the 1960s I loved America from afar, glimpsing, through black and white grainy televisions, the Beverley Hillbillies and (when ITV hadn’t sold enough advertising for the commercial breaks) occasional clips of the Beach Boys and the Four Seasons.
I really did believe that in Gotham City, Chief O’Hara would breathlessly and excitedly inform Commissioner Gordon that The Riddler was leaving diabolical clues to dreadful crimes all over the city, and that a call through on the Batphone was the only way for the villain to be apprehended.
(Batman, in Episode One: "The Riddler's mind is like an artichoke. You have to rip off spiny leaves to reach the heart!")
I wanted to go and live in America more than anything else in the world.
In the tiny sweet shop around the corner from where I lived, near the Thames, in Middlesex, I would browse the carousel of American comics inexplicably on display amongst the ageing copies of Woman’s Weekly and The People’s Friend. There was a battle for supremacy between Stan Lee’s Marvel Comics, which were certainly seen as the cooler option, and DC Comics which seemed a bit more establishment, but DC had Superman.
American comics were like a spy hole into a world that was so far removed from a small town twenty five miles outside of London that could ever be imagined.
It was the advertisements. Grits (what were they?), guns and gum. And ant farms; in a small quarter page advert, these tiny ranches of insect colonies would be depicted as the most exotic and educational talking point that could feature in your home. I dreamed of owning an ant farm, though I suspect my mother would have taken an opposing view following their almost inevitable escape and creation of a new home under the floorboards.
Then, through the almost impossibly romantic medium of pirate radio ships bouncing on the North Sea swell, ‘God Only Knows’, ‘Good Vibrations’ and ‘California Dreamin’.
The Beatles produced Penny Lane and The Kinks sang of the sun setting over Waterloo; but gorgeous hymns that they are – we knew these places. They were our identity and our home.
We knew nothing of the life of a Wichita Lineman and we didn’t know the way to San Jose.
The first time I flew to America, I had to catch my breath as we descended to Chicago O’Hare and I could see the yellow taxi cabs on the city streets way below. The Man From UNCLE, Mr Magoo, and Top Cat; the yellow taxis had become icons of this mysterious but desirable lifestyle, so far away across the Atlantic to a dream filled teenager in England.
Nothing, really nothing, in America disappointed me. My dreams came true and I found new loves: stores called Piggly Wiggly, drive through banking, diners in the north of Wisconsin where the menu hadn’t changed in fifty years and waitresses flirted with the customers in the hope of larger tips.
So now that we have moved further on from the global village and the world is inside our houses and apartments, I know everything there is to know about America and Americans.
Nah, of course not.
Every week, Ira Glass offers us a window to the soul of America. ‘This American Life’ reports on stories of people doing extraordinary things in ordinary lives.
If like me, you are fascinated, sometimes appalled, often enlightened, by the astonishing way that the U.S.A. manages to bring all of its disparate parts together, then This American Life will only add to your journey of understanding.
‘TAL’ as we shall call it here, is produced in Chicago for the National Public Radio (NPR) network, and is easy to find as a podcast from several sources.
Here’s the best place to find links to current This American Life shows, and the entire archive can be accessed for free.
I can’t guarantee TAL will make you fall in love with America to the same degree of giddiness that is in my heart, but I shall accuse you of having flint for a soul if you don’t find yourself moved by This American Life – The Parent Trap.
This week I have:
Been reading ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’ – Peter Doggett’s splendidly researched book about the painful separation of The Beatles through their latter years of untogetherness
Viewed the first five episodes of The Big C – a very watchable, light and shade comedy drama about a suburban woman, recently diagnosed with cancer
Been listening to the works of John Tavener – here’s a Spotify link to the slightly scary Lamentations And Praises (I suggest a dark, candle-lit room for this one)
Decided not to fly to Libya for a short ‘get away from it all’ break
Terence Dackombe - March 2011
(follow me on Twitter at @sirterence)
OK by me in America
Ev’rything free in America
For a small fee in America”
Today, in England, and without even paying that small fee, I can live my life as if I was in Boston, Milwaukee or Los Angeles.
I can access live American TV, the New York Times is just a click away, and thanks to my iPhone, I can drive along the M4 surrounded by the urban sprawl of West London, listening live to KTYD-FM in Santa Barbara and imagine I am driving the Pacific Highway, just like Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate.
In 2011, we are closer than ever to being the 51st State, if only in the cultural sense of interaction and accessibility.
To a boy (well, this boy) growing up in a 1960s England that was just beginning to finally shake off the exhaustion of post war rationing, and starting to come to terms with the loss of Empire, the United States of America might as well have been somewhere a million light years away in another solar system.
America was the land of plenty, of excess, where there was space, room to breathe and a burning optimism for the future.
But nobody hopped on a plane to the States. There were no holidays in Florida, no weekend getaways to New York.
America!
In the 1960s I loved America from afar, glimpsing, through black and white grainy televisions, the Beverley Hillbillies and (when ITV hadn’t sold enough advertising for the commercial breaks) occasional clips of the Beach Boys and the Four Seasons.
I really did believe that in Gotham City, Chief O’Hara would breathlessly and excitedly inform Commissioner Gordon that The Riddler was leaving diabolical clues to dreadful crimes all over the city, and that a call through on the Batphone was the only way for the villain to be apprehended.
(Batman, in Episode One: "The Riddler's mind is like an artichoke. You have to rip off spiny leaves to reach the heart!")
I wanted to go and live in America more than anything else in the world.
In the tiny sweet shop around the corner from where I lived, near the Thames, in Middlesex, I would browse the carousel of American comics inexplicably on display amongst the ageing copies of Woman’s Weekly and The People’s Friend. There was a battle for supremacy between Stan Lee’s Marvel Comics, which were certainly seen as the cooler option, and DC Comics which seemed a bit more establishment, but DC had Superman.
American comics were like a spy hole into a world that was so far removed from a small town twenty five miles outside of London that could ever be imagined.
It was the advertisements. Grits (what were they?), guns and gum. And ant farms; in a small quarter page advert, these tiny ranches of insect colonies would be depicted as the most exotic and educational talking point that could feature in your home. I dreamed of owning an ant farm, though I suspect my mother would have taken an opposing view following their almost inevitable escape and creation of a new home under the floorboards.
Then, through the almost impossibly romantic medium of pirate radio ships bouncing on the North Sea swell, ‘God Only Knows’, ‘Good Vibrations’ and ‘California Dreamin’.
The Beatles produced Penny Lane and The Kinks sang of the sun setting over Waterloo; but gorgeous hymns that they are – we knew these places. They were our identity and our home.
We knew nothing of the life of a Wichita Lineman and we didn’t know the way to San Jose.
The first time I flew to America, I had to catch my breath as we descended to Chicago O’Hare and I could see the yellow taxi cabs on the city streets way below. The Man From UNCLE, Mr Magoo, and Top Cat; the yellow taxis had become icons of this mysterious but desirable lifestyle, so far away across the Atlantic to a dream filled teenager in England.
Nothing, really nothing, in America disappointed me. My dreams came true and I found new loves: stores called Piggly Wiggly, drive through banking, diners in the north of Wisconsin where the menu hadn’t changed in fifty years and waitresses flirted with the customers in the hope of larger tips.
So now that we have moved further on from the global village and the world is inside our houses and apartments, I know everything there is to know about America and Americans.
Nah, of course not.
Every week, Ira Glass offers us a window to the soul of America. ‘This American Life’ reports on stories of people doing extraordinary things in ordinary lives.
If like me, you are fascinated, sometimes appalled, often enlightened, by the astonishing way that the U.S.A. manages to bring all of its disparate parts together, then This American Life will only add to your journey of understanding.
‘TAL’ as we shall call it here, is produced in Chicago for the National Public Radio (NPR) network, and is easy to find as a podcast from several sources.
Here’s the best place to find links to current This American Life shows, and the entire archive can be accessed for free.
I can’t guarantee TAL will make you fall in love with America to the same degree of giddiness that is in my heart, but I shall accuse you of having flint for a soul if you don’t find yourself moved by This American Life – The Parent Trap.
This week I have:
Been reading ‘You Never Give Me Your Money’ – Peter Doggett’s splendidly researched book about the painful separation of The Beatles through their latter years of untogetherness
Viewed the first five episodes of The Big C – a very watchable, light and shade comedy drama about a suburban woman, recently diagnosed with cancer
Been listening to the works of John Tavener – here’s a Spotify link to the slightly scary Lamentations And Praises (I suggest a dark, candle-lit room for this one)
Decided not to fly to Libya for a short ‘get away from it all’ break
Terence Dackombe - March 2011
(follow me on Twitter at @sirterence)
