Listening to Terry Gross interview the Beastie Boys on Fresh Air made me feel a familiar cool vs. uncool inner-conflict. Dave Davies’ NPR Poet Smurf-voiced introduction “License To Ill” made me laugh a superior hipper-than-though laugh, but a pang of recognition followed: I’m a little bit Terry, and I’m a little bit rock and roll.
Okay, I’m a lot Terry—I’ve got at least 50 % Terry Gross in my soul. Even among my rebellious girlfriends in high school I was significantly Terry by comparison (designated driving, obeying curfews, actually going to class), so I’m kidding myself if I’m not at 73% Terry Gross capacity at this juncture.
What do I have in common with Terry? I don’t know anything about Terry Gross. But when I hear her voice and her fresh fresh air I think Terry is so very… I wonder if Terry, too, drives a station wagon tuned to NPR. I’m guessing she needs to listen to something else in her off time—maybe Marilyn Manson evens her out. Perhaps she, too, finds herself at a stoplight, windows down, unselfconsciously singing Salt-n-Pepa’s “Push It” in a clear soprano vibrato next to a car full of attractive young men as they roll up their windows and turn up Nas. Because I’m picturing Terry with windows that manually roll up, aren’t you? I’m willing to bet on one thing. Terry Gross wears Danskos. And so do I. 73 percent of the time.
So, In actuality I’m 87% Terry and 13% rock and roll. A little UnTerry girl hovers over my left shoulder and demands to party once in a while (wherin party means more than one drink and staying up past midnight). So I don’t drop the boys at school and lead a double-life growing MILF weed under the alias Autumn LeBeuf, but I have SECRETS.
For instance, I love to pepper my life with the profane. Occasional online profanity, frequent profanity with my girlfriends, and never ever profanity in front of my kids. Okay, yes often with my kids, but really super soft and in Mandarin Chinese. Everything out loud with my kids remains very Terry, like
“I feel frustrated when you do that.”
and
“When you speak to me that way it hurts my feelings.”
and sometimes
“IF YOU ASK ME FOR CANDY ONE MORE TIME I’M GOING TO TAKE IT AWAY AND YOU WILL NEVER GET IT BACK. NOW GET YOUR BARE BUTT OFF YOUR BROTHER’S HEAD AND STOP NAME-CALLING, YOU MUFFIN-CHUCKER.” VERY un-Terry.
Another secret? My UnTerry likes to, occasionally, get my freak on.
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| UnTerry at Sparklecorn, BlogHer ’10 |
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| Girls’ weekend 2011 in The Dells. Maria, UnTerry, and… umm…Rumplestiltskin? |
As I say “get my freak on” I hear Terry Gross say it, punching the consonants, articulating the space in between each word, and putting emphasis on the third word “freak” like the B in the NBC chime “Get…My..Frrreak..On.”
So I’m rocking out with Terry Gross and The Beastie Boys, feeling very my mom circa 1985 stick-shift Honda Civic owner (totally aTerry Gross car), while I’m clinging to my un-Terry memory of myself at 17 years old going AWOL from the high school physics trip to Great America to see The Beastie Boys live in Milwaukee.
This was a little bit rock and roll: The Big City, The Beastie Boys, and cute college boys. We snuck on to the 21 and over main floor, where a wall of Beastie Boys sound slapped me upside the head and UnTerry liked it (Terry smiled like she liked it). The mosh pit hurled me like a pinball boooinnnggg against a sweaty red-faced fan and then tilta-whirrled me off again to “oops sorry” against an older girl and her cigarette tip and spilling beer. Even at 17 I straddled these battling forces of cool vs uncool, rebel vs. secret nerd. I was rock and roll on the way in to the throng, and Terry Gross flailing my way out. UnTerry had a beer in my hand, but it was warm and two hours old because Terry drank it so slow.
At one point I found myself next to a boy I crushed, and I pulled out my best fly girl freaky-deaky moves. He did not freak the UnTerry back. There was no mutual freaking. HE LEFT ME FREAKLESS and the Terry within wished she was back home watching Top of The Pops with Julie Andrews and eating Stouffers French bread pizzas.
All things considered, my Terry/UnTerry combo has left me in pretty good standing. I survived my young life with my dignity largely in tact, but found enough unTerry moments to feel like I sufficiently rebelled. My very Terry earnestness and empathic listening skills make for easy authentic connections with other people, and when presented with a microphone I can get my diction on.
But every once in a while, I’m a little bit rock and roll. Even if I’m wearing my very Terry Danskos.
I think Terry Gross IS cool.
That’s how nerdy I am… I love how she says, “FreeeeeeeeeeshAIIIIIR” all one word like that.
I love it when he has “my kind of people” on. I remember a few months ago Billie Jo from Greenday was his guest. Suddenly I felt cool again–I had just seen them in concert AND I listen to NPR and somehow these two worlds came together. Quite a juxtaposition, but fabulous.
And I’m far more Terry also. I only think I am an aging rock star.
Cheers.
VB
Thank you for this tribute to all those of us who have been left freakless at one time or another.
I love that this will now be in the top search results for Terry Gross. And I love the second picture of you dancing.
Ok, I am now at work and walking into the office as the 20 yr old intern walked out, this post hit home at a whole new level. Seriously, when I worked off the Capitol square I felt like a grown up. Now, working at the other end of State St here on campus, I just feel old. :/ Decidedly un-hip. Thanks for the camaraderie.
I’m 50% Carl Kasell. I’ll let you figure out which 50%.
I worship Terry Gross and now I know why I like you so much.
I missed all 80’s music because I started standup back then. But I can tell you why you should always use a multi-directional mic as opposed to one that isn’t.
Also? How to furnish the inside of a room if you want to get optimum laughs. Also? Never have overhead lighting. You’ll look like a ghoul.
And there you have my 80’s education.
Now that Liane Hansen is gone I will have to focus entirely on Terry Gross… except when I picture Wendi as Carl Kasell.
Freakness confirmed.
😉 A.
I’m at least 50% Terry Gross, or credit at least 50% of my interesting-ness to her on-air tutelage, anyway. Though I am completely out of step with her when it comes to jazz music.
Bonus little known fact: I am about 20% Ira Glass. The 20% of me that demands quirky mood music be played in the background while I tell long-winded, yet entertaining stories. And only played about five minutes after I start talking.
i feel like dancing right now. If only my knees would cooperate.
dang it.
wow. . . You sound very well balanced ::))
Yay! Comments working again!
Ridiculously rad post. Terry is so damn very, I agree. “Feeling very my mom” –laughing my head off at that statement. So funny. Oh yeah. That and your growing percentage of Terry-ness. Up to 87%? Damn. Even more hilarious.
Yes, this black woman originally from L.A. loves Terry, too. Yeah, girl, Terry is so very — universal. Hell, anybody that made Tracy Morgan from 30 rock cry (you’re damn right she did!) is down with me.
Knew we were kindred spirits– who else would both think to make posts including Terry Gross?
http://www.gradydoctor.com/2010/11/last-word.html
But I think I’m only like. . .31% Terry, though.
HE LEFT ME FREAKLESS
and getting your diction on?
Big Mama’s back in the house, girls.
I am laughing too hard and shaking my head in very Terry-like empathy to comment articulately on this post – which is GENIUS. And HYSTERICAL.
I would pay a lot of money to crawl up inside your head for an hour or two. Seriously, woman. You are so talented. Or, should I say, BOTH of you are.
Okay no idea who Terry Gross is but I too have bounced back and forth between Terry and Rock and Roll. Sadly, I think I’m entrenched in 95% Terry and 5% rock and roll now that I’m in the over 40 set.
Do you think Terry wears Chicos?
I was very unTerry until my late 20’s. I saw the Beasties at Lollapalooza (yes ma’am) in New Orleans in August. UnTerry did not care that it was about 112 degrees and humid.
At almost 40, I’m going to estimate an 84% level of Terry in my being.
Oh, and what One Crafty Mother said. Yep, I heartily second that.
My god how I’ve longed for someone to discuss Terry with! Since I left L.A., where I used to listen to NPR all the freakin’ time, I’ve hardly listened at all, and I seriously miss them. So does my I.Q. I’ve become an oblivious yokel out here in Pennsyltucky and all aspects of my previously-NPR-fueled personality are deteriorating rapidly. I no longer know how much Terry is in me, I just know that I used to get such a kick out of listening to her. And partly because I couldn’t quite get a handle on her. But I never once spoke about her aloud. Does this count? Terry would probably say that it does. Perhaps the real Terry is less important than the Terry that we of the collective unconscious have created… it is our mutual idea of her, the way in which we bond over Terry and the ways in which we use her as a measuring stick for our own inner… something… that makes her so damn important and cool. Thanks for an awesome post. So glad to know we’re all sharing this weird Terry/UnTerry experience… Question is, do you think Terry is ever ironic about being Terry? Or is she really just… Terry?
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You unseated my previous favorite of your pieces with this one. I am so 91% Terry that it pains me. You know where I become 100% Terry? Buying unmentionables. Wouldn’t Terry say unmentionables, too?
I want to say so much more – like Terry would – but I’m flabbergasted by our mutual love of Fresh Air and all things Gross.
I’m going to tweet this shit now. That was so un-Terry.
Will now Google Terry Gross so I can figure out my % of cool.
Although how chix can get their freaks on in Hells Dells in 2011 (or any time for that matter)is beyond me, but I am open to your future explanation!
Yes, me too. I love Terry Gross. Sometimes I listen to her podcast before I fall asleep. Her voice really comforts me. Her interviewing style, her knowledge on many subjects, her laugh. She is iconic.
Yes, Terry! I want to nestle in her arms while she reads me a bedtime story written by Terry herself. A bed time tale about a very tired librarian reading Tolstoy and falling asleep in her country feather bed as Rumplestiltskin danced a merry jig outside her frosted window. Melissa http://thepoopofothers.wordpress.com (sorry, it won’t let me post my URL in another format!)
I think rock and roll is only a little bit rock and roll.
And Terry rocks.
That’s the way it is.
Cheers,
Casey
Ann – this is one of my absolute favorite posts of yours. I’m pretty much 90% Terry Gross. If only they had Beastie Boys concerts in Saudi Arabia where I grew up.
ps – I should buy Danskos.
xoxo
This immediately reminded me of the classic Terry Gross interview with legendary rocker and KISS frontman Gene Simmons. He was so uncool, such a major asshat that I’d say we’d all be better off if we were more Terry Gross than rock ‘n’ roll.
Here’s a link to the interview transcript:
http://www.cpworks.org/rotton_school/blog/TERRYGRO.HTM
I loved all of this but REALLY, REALLY loved that you use profanity in Mandarin Chinese. I use it in Urdu. We are so much alike!
Love Terry, but what I find extremely annoying is her tendency to begin every question with the word ‘SO’. She must say ‘so’ about 150 times every show, and it’s akin to saying ‘like’ or ‘you know’ — a verbal crutch that she needs to abandon. Other than that, I love listening to her!