Having painfully realized that wearing Cronkite-like glasses in the 1st grade was more style than substance, I quickly had to figure out exactly what the 'substance' was that made him so important. Clearly, it was the words he used and the way in which he delivered them that made people want to hear what he had to say. Now I don't know about you, but in 1st grade I didn't know a lot of important words, let alone how to say them.
I set out on a quest to learn to read anything and everything I could...out loud. At the grocery store, I would walk up and down the aisles, reading the words on the cereal boxes, shampoo bottles, and the headlines on the tabloids...out loud. I embarrassed my mother in public on more than one occasion with my verbal onslaught. I read any book or magazine I could find around the house. I read road signs as we traveled across town to my grandparents house, only to arrive and realize that they had more and different things to read...out loud.
Then, one day it hit me. I was just reading, to be reading. I wasn't 'presenting' the words in a way that made anyone want to listen to them. I needed to learn how to do this properly. But where could I find the important words to practice doing such a thing? I didn't have news scripts from which to read. Or did I? I grabbed the newspaper and began cutting out the articles. They contained most of the same stories and words that he was reading every night, out loud.
I went to my room (because isn't that where all kids play out their dreams and fantasies?) and made my very own anchor desk. I organized the stories I had cut out of the paper by topic. News, sports, weather, etc. I had to learn how to 'present' these words like he did, staring straight ahead as if telling each person individually about the news of the day. Since my little brother was too small to hold up cue cards, I went with plan 'B'. I taped each story to the wall opposite my desk. Viola, instant teleprompter. I then placed my black-framed glasses upon my face, turned on my desk lamp for lighting, and in that instant, I became THE anchor of the Evening News, as I 'presented' story after story.
After weeks of 'presenting' the news to no one in particular in my room, the time finally came. Our teacher asked for a volunteer to read a page from our book...out loud. My hand shot up so fast, you'd have thought another mission to the moon had just blasted off. I couldn't understand why no one else raised their hand. Was it the frames that intimidated them? When the teacher called on me, I knew exactly what to do. I sat up straight, glasses perched upon my nose, cleared my throat, and 'presented' those important words from our textbook to my classmates, as if I was being beamed into millions of homes, just like that important man in the black frames did every night on my TV. At that moment, I was so glad that he had taught me how to read.
Derek Chappell
-The Voice of Your Business
