Can I just tell you that I LOVE Terry Gross. Seriously, she is the best interviewer ever. If you didn't grow up being force-fed NPR in the car then you may not know what I'm talking about. (Though I don't remember listening to Terry Gross but I did get an NPR addiction which then introduced me to her show). Terry has a daily show on NPR-Fresh Air (weird name, cool show). She interviews all sorts of people and I'm telling you, it doesn't matter who it is (with one exception)--you will be drawn in. I have learned so many things from her interviews ranging from details about the new Muppets movie to some guy who wrote the most comprehensive book on Bin Laden and Al Quaeda (how do you spell that?). The one bad interview I heard was with Doris Day--she sounded so strange and awkward. She wasn't in a studio and might have been on the phone. Anyway, that is the only bad one I have heard. With that exception she never has awkward interview moments that you often see on the Today Show or local news. As if!
I've started listening to Fresh Air while going for a run. It makes the time and the miles so much more enjoyable. Last night I was listening to her remembrance of Maurice Sendak. By the end I was sobbing (while running which makes it worse because of the heavy breathing). The raw emotions and feelings that he expressed in his last interview were hard to take. It was sad to me because he is an aetheist(sp?) and he had lost many of his friends to old age and he was sad that he would never see them again. He did think that he would see his brother though--somehow. He also expressed how beautiful the world is and that he will be sad to leave it. I'm getting choked up again. I'm not sure why it effected me so. I didn't even know that he had still been alive until I heard that he died yesterday. Anyway, you should listen to it. The link is below. It is 45 minutes long taking excerpts from four interviews ranging from 1986-2011. The last portion is the one that really got me but I enjoyed all of them.
http://www.npr.org/2012/05/08/152248901/fresh-air-remembers-author-maurice-sendak
Someday maybe I will post my make-believe show where Terry interviews me....
