WTOP Interview
Actual Journal: Last week, I indicated that I would be part of a radio broadcast on 7/28/07. I have not written about it since it happened. I intentionally waited until today, when Blue Water Media was able to launch the interview on the Home Page of 38 Lemon.
I never quite know how a live radio interview will go, simply because I am not the host. Instead, the host fires away questions and I respond. It's sort of like meeting someone for breakfast and just chatting over coffee (only a lot of folks are listening in). Do you know how those conversations will go? Can anyone predict? Well, the same is true of such a radio interview.
Saturday morning
It was a beautiful Saturday morning here in Washington, D.C. this past weekend. I had never been to WTOP radio station, although I have known these call letters ever since I was a high school kid growing up in this area. So, it felt pretty neat to finally see the building. I had actually passed this studio for the past decade and I never knew it, simply because I took a parallel street one block over and never got close enough to see the call station letters on the front of the building.
Participants in broadcast
When I got inside the building, it was only a few minutes before broadcast. The host was John McCullough. I know John because he is the lawyer who put together my Revocable Living Trust back in December of 2004 when I was diagnosed with brain cancer. He completed that task in less than one month. As it turns out, he also has a radio broadcast called Smart Business.
The other person joining the interview was Curt Schwab, President and co-founder of Blue Water Media, the company that engineers and hosts the 38 Lemon website. Curt was there on day 1 when I asked him to put together a website just after my brain cancer diagnosis, and he has very much been a part of this journey ever since. He has been behind the scenes to most, but he has played a critical role in developing 38 Lemon and bringing it to life for so many others.
We all squeezed into this small soundbooth, padded with sound-absorbing foam so that every breath and sound we made was picked up. We even had a "sneeze" button under the table -- a little red button that we could hold down if we sneezed or had to cough. That would turn off our microphone for as long as we held that button.
Gist of this interview
Once Blue Water Media edited out the commercial breaks, the entire interview lasted for 37'15" (37 minutes and 15 seconds). Here is how the interview played out.
1.) As it turns out, the radio interview gave a broad overview of my "brain cancer story," going all the way back to the co-founding of Rivermine. Being a story called "Smart Business," John has a great interest in local and national business, so he had lots of curious questions about Rivermine, how it got started, what it does, the dynamics of venture capital investments, etc. So, we spent about 10 minutes on that subject.
2.) Then, John got into my brain cancer diagnosis. We asked about how that happened, from symptoms to surgery to chemotherapy. It was interesting to have these prodding questions, forcing me to recall specific details that seem so far back in time.
3.) Finally, Curt Schwab was introduced and we talked about how Blue Water Media became involved with 38 Lemon over time. One thing I failed to mention in the interview is that I approached Blue Water Media in December of 2004 as an individual and was essentially asking for a personal website. Since Blue Water Media is for corporations and not individuals, it was highly unusual for them to take me on as a customer. But, they had the vision to become involved, knowing full well that I was a brain cancer patient during our first meeting. This speaks highly to Curt Schwab and the other co-founder, Greg Jenkins.
Where the interview can be heard
Currently, this interview is on the Home Page at the very top of the left column. Clicking on the picture is all that needs to be done to hear this 37-minute interview.
Reflections after listening to this recording
My brain cancer diagnosis seems so easy to talk about now, in retrospect. I found myself inflecting a lot of humor into the interview, which I did not quite expect. I suppose that I have talked about brain cancer so often that I can rattle off my story without blinking these days. That was not always the case -- especially when I did not have information about what was going on, what needed to be done, and what a reasonable prognosis was for me.
While I have almost reverence for the topic of brain cancer, I also find myself responding to the dynamics of the people I am with. When the tone is serious, I adapt. When the tone is humorous, I adapt. When the tone is scholarly, I adapt. When the tone has to do with projections for the future, I adapt.
The one thing that does NOT change, though, is my fundamental belief that the brain cancer community, in whole, is making tremendous progress that indeed justifies "realistic optimism." Perhaps that comes across in the tone of my voice in this interview. Certainly, that is something I feel.
And if all else fails, people who come to 38 Lemon can choose to hear my voice rather than just read my words. There are multiple options on this website for communicating, consistent with this multi-media world that has evolved in the past decade.
Source: WTOP 103.5 FM
