Letter from the Editor
Most of us wouldn’t fare very well with a camera following our every move for a month. If we were lucky, it would catch us committing only minor-league pettiness, small fits of whining, and maybe one or two moments of self-centeredness.
If we were lucky, it would also show us doing something a little extra for our spouse, being really sensitive to the needs of one of our kids, or doing volunteer work. If we were lucky.
Now, imagine that someone takes those thirty days of recordings and edits it so it will hold audience attention, so it makes millions of people want to watch your antics again and again and again.
With ratings at stake, what will NOT make it into the final cut is you being nice to someone — too boring — or doing a favor for a neighbor — really boring — or walking the dog every single day.
Boring. Boring. Desperately boring.
I know exactly the moment fame would strike for me. The camera would show me as I made a new roast chicken recipe a week ago, trying to follow instructions that demand I lift the hot chicken from the pan with wooden spoons. Have you ever tried to lift a chicken with wooden spoons? Hot chickens are slippery critters. As I attempt to perform this kitchen miracle, my dog decides to bark hysterically at people who have the nerve to walk in front of her house. Rattled, I still manage to
juggle the chicken to the counter but ultimately lose control of it and it bounces — yes, bounces — into the vegetables. My kitchen is easily 100 degrees. The ceiling fan is a joke, and now I’m having a hot flash when suddenly I hear a male voice out of nowhere. I scream! Yes, I literally scream in surprise, as though someone was coming at me with a meat cleaver. It takes me a second to collect myself, and there is my neighbor, now looking very sheepish, standing at my front door. I laugh as I go to meet him, trying to look harmless. Of course I apologize for screaming. Looking a little like he wishes he was not actually saying the words, he invites me and Joey over for drinks. He then backs away as if he’s afraid to turn his back on me.
If I was being filmed for a month, this is what America would see when they turned on their television: Me, juggling chicken, sweat pouring down my back, screaming at a poor innocent man who just stopped by to be neighborly.
Knowing this about myself, I find it utterly amazing that Debbie Beebe’s thirty-three days on “Survivor” features only one meltdown. I suspect the reason she doesn’t get a great deal of air time in the first half of the show is she’s just too nice, pleasant, and helpful to keep America coming back week after week. After meeting her, I’m not surprised she had the determination to prevail against hunger, cold, heat, and physically demanding challenges. But that she managed to do all that while remaining completely sane is the real accomplishment. I think it’s also why she loves being a principal at Drake Middle School. This is what it takes to care for kids at that awkward age and love it.
That’s way more than simply surviving. This is thriving.
So bravo to Debbie and the great game she played, and hurrah again for the great job she does every day.
You go, Debbie. You do Lee County proud.
