Planet of the Apes, a recent retirement and a fond farewell to a civic hero – Three Is a Magic Number
Three is a Magic Number by Steven Uhles
For every beginning there must be an ending, for each Alpha and Omega. That’s the symmetry of the universe and, despite our best efforts, everything and, yes, everyone, has both a starting point and a finish line. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately as I look at my own life. On one hand I feel like my work here at Augusta Today, which I am finding incredibly satisfying, is just beginning. On a more melancholic note, I also see the family I have devoted – and will continue to devote – enormous love and energy to beginning to dissipate as part of the natural order of things. Children just don’t need their father as young adults in the same engaged way they did as children. They are moving forward. Moving on. They are beginning their adult lives as I watch their childhood end.
Beginnings and endings.
With that in mind I’d like to dedicate this week’s Magic Three to beginnings and endings – some very real and finite, others more transitional and one fanciful. Buckle up. We are ready to begin.
This is not goodbye
What an extraordinary run. Richard Rogers has been on our televisions and, more significantly, in our lives, for more than 31 years. He’s a media giant, a personality so respected and significant that, despite having been in the same trenches for many years, I feel a little celebrity-struck around. Over the years we have shared many of the same beats – most notably as go-to guys for our late-and-great friend James Brown. That means I’ve had the pleasure, and educational opportunity, to see him in professional action and I’m not afraid to admit I’ve probably copped a couple of his signature moves. The most significant, and perhaps least startling, is clearly communicating that good journalism comes from a place of caring. I’ve watched from the sidelines as Rogers spoke – either to a source or an audience – and I’ve always been struck by his ability to make that caring connection. And while caring is neither a skill nor talent – it must come from a place of honesty – being able to make people see and understand that is a real gift.
I, like many, will miss seeing Rogers on television. He was so good at what he did. But I’m also excited for him and for what, I believe, he still has to give to this community. He recently told me he wasn’t going anywhere. I’m glad and anxious to bear witness to his new beginning.
Part of the fabric
One of the first people with real influence that I met upon returning to Augusta was Patrick Blanchard Sr., who died Monday. When I met Blanchard, however, I didn’t know he was both a mover and a shaker. We didn’t talk about moving and shaking. We talked some about music, about how the city had changed in my time away and about how deeply he cared about Augusta. I thought he was just a guy – a member of my father’s generation who had taken some interest in what I was doing as a young writer. That is, I think, true from his perspective. But what I quickly learned is that all roads led to that guy I had talked to on the street. His influence ran deep and wide. He had started three banks. He served habitually on boards. He was in the room where decisions were made. That was why I respected him.
I liked him because he was a storyteller who was always quietly the smartest guy in the room. He was a community champion willing to allow those around him take the win. He was the respected and accomplished Southern gentleman who would take time to talk to a woefully young and dumb journalist on a Broad Street corner.
And while it is true that, over the years, I spent more time with his musician son Patrick Jr., I remained curious about the father, a man I understood knew things, did things, and, in the end, left the city he called home a far better place than he found it.
Monkeys gone to heaven – or Hilton Head
I understand that this, for the most part, is a terrible story. More than 40 monkeys have escaped from a primate research facility in the close-to-the-coast town of Yemassee, South Carolina. The rhesus macaques are, at the time this piece is being written, still on the loose. I suspect that roaming primates are a danger to the community and in danger themselves. It has been reported that all the monkeys are young females that have not been used in testing and too young to carry disease. Still, anyone that has bumped up against a bachelorette party knows that a large group of young women, if they are getting hangry, is not to be taken lightly.
So, what does this have to do with beginnings and endings?
“Planet of the Apes.” That movie teaches us that this is the moment humanity exits stage right. While I am being facetious, it would be fitting if an apocalypse began because a group of girls decided to skip and head toward the beach. Don’t forget your SPF Miss Macaques.