The First Fifty

Dave sez,

I'm not having any trouble turning 50. "The big Five-O" ("Book 'em Danno!") I think that's maybe because a lot of people tell me that I don't act look my age.

I was in my late twenties when Cathy told me I would be great in radio. Well, she might have actually said I had a face for radio... I spent a few months as an intern at Shadow Traffic, in the Hancock Building in Chicago. Shadow Traffic provided road reports for all of the radio stations in Chicago. On a clear day, you can see not only the major highways - the Dan Ryan, the Eisenhower, the Stevenson, Lake Shore Drive and the Skyway - you can see Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa. After my internship at Shadow Traffic, I worked part-time as a paid intern at US*99. I worked there a couple of years and then got a job overnights at Q-98.5 in Rockford. I was the local board operator for the nationally syndicated After Mid-Nite with Blair Garner. When the show was automated, I moved to mornings as the morning show producer. When I started working mornings, a new afternoon personality was hired. As we got to know each other, I found out how old he was and he learned how old I was.

Cathy's and my anniversary came up. He asked if we had to ask our parents' permission to get married. I told him Yeah, I went to dinner with Cathy's mom and dad and asked permission to marry her. He stopped me and asked if I had to get my parents' permission to get married. Our afternoon guy was eighteen, and he thought I was the same age, and wondered how I could be married for five years. We both had a big laugh when I told him that I was thirty and that Cathy and I got married when I was twenty-five. He told me that I did not look that old.

To this day, people still tell me that I do not act look my age. Of course, my wife has been telling me for the last quarter century to grow up. Now that we have kids, it's kind of a different story. She tells me to lighten up.

I'll never forget when Justin first came home. He had first started school. I guess all the kids started talking about their parents and how old their parents are. He came home and asked how old Cathy and I were. I think he was a little surprised that we're older parents - or at least, older than his friends' parents were in the newcomers program. Cathy and I talked to him one night about it, and we asked if he was having any problems with our ages. It may have been a challenge at first, but now he makes a joke about how old we are.

Ethan and Bella were a little surprised at first, too.

I have no explanation for this collar...

Bells saw this old picture of me, and laughed so hard she snorted. "That's you?!" I said, Yeah, that's me. She couldn't believe it at first.

There are moments when I wish that Cathy and I had started our family a little earlier - when we were younger. Just like there are times when I wish we hadn't missed our kids early years. Those are fleeting moments. What we have is pretty special and cool. As much as I would like to change things, I wouldn't want to change to much to miss what we have. Yeah, I wish we could have been there when each one of our kids was born, and been there from the beginning. We're still together now, and that's pretty cool, too. Cathy and I may not have been able to change their diapers or be there at the beginning. But there are still some pretty cool, special times ahead.

There are still a lot of good years ahead.