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| Under Exposed...Some memories by Shel Haber |
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Some memories In the last few decades I must have met thousands of people. Most are stashed away as vague memories in the filing cabinet at the back of my brain. Others I will never forget. They shaped the way I think. -- Half a lifetime ago, we lived on the sixth floor of an elevator apartment building in the Bronx. One awful Saturday, our new tiny baby's fever soared and she went into convulsions. Her little limbs shook uncontrollably, her face turning red. In a panic we called 911 as we applied wet towels. Then we heard the siren. The sound stopped downstairs. Then, just as suddenly, our baby relaxed as her normal color returned. As Jan picked her up, our baby gurgled then giggled and smiled as if nothing had happened. There was a loud knock and when I opened the door, standing there, sweating and breathing hard was an overweight NY City police sergeant. Unable to catch the elevator soon enough, he had run up six flights to help a baby in distress. He saw the relief in our faces as we told him the baby was ok. We saw the relief on his face as he accepted a glass of water and a chair. When we tried to apologize for the false alarm, he put a fatherly arm around the young mother's shoulders and said, "Honey, you go ahead and call us anytime. We're so happy when it ends like this." We never learned the name of the cop and we never thanked him enough. But whenever I hear somebody complain about a cop eating donuts on the job, I think of that sergeant. I know if the call comes, any cop will run toward danger to help a stranger in trouble.
In my checkered past, I have worked on several films and many TV commercials. One commercial was a 30-second grand opus selling Maxwell house coffee. The setting was a country general store with Margaret Hamilton playing the store owner. A great character actor, she was perhaps best known for her film portrayal of the wicked witch in the 1939 Wizard of Oz. At the time of the coffee commercial she was in her seventies and plagued with arthritis. She even had trouble rising from a chair. This day, when she was called to go on camera, Ms. Hamilton hobbled to the edge of the set. To those of us standing nearby, her pain was evident. Then she took three deep breaths set her shoulders back and stepped into the general store. In that step, forty years disappeared from her body. All signs of her infirmity vanished. Her voice was clear and dynamic. She was on. We had seen a true professional in action. Her movement was real, as was her voice. She was the witty store owner of the script. I learned to respect a real professional--whether an actor, surgeon or cab driver.
When I was a little kid a teacher once said, "Look me in the eyes when I'm talking to you. I want the truth." Many years later I met Eric. He produced commercials for ad agencies. He was a crook in a good business suit. He would pad the cost of every job, overcharge the cost of the film crew then blame the unions. He would tell the agency the job took five days when it took four. He paid off the people at the agency who might expose him. The meeting was on the 55th floor. Everyone was there, including the president of the ad agency and the client, whose product we were advertising. Eric lied a blue streak to the president while looking him squarely in the eye. Then the president turned to the client and repeated the lies while looking him in the eye. Going down in the elevator, I asked Dave, a top-notch director and friend, about Eric. Dave said, "I just don't hear his concoctions. That's why he hires me and I can hire you and you can hire the rest of the gang." Dave was looking at the elevator door as he spoke, not in my eyes so I believed him. Eric died a few years later. In a bar where the TV crews hang out, the speculation was that now, at the Pearly Gates, Eric is trying to con St. Peter while looking him squarely in the eye. The betting at the bar was three to one that Eric would pull off his biggest con. I would like that grade school teacher to know that many people can look you in the eye, smile, fabricate a whopper and never blink. Shel Haber is a contributing editor and co-publisher of The Nyack Villager. .... |
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