by Roy Exum
posted January 12, 2009
 Roy Exum |
I found out a long time ago that public speaking is the easiest thing in the world if you make sure you enjoy it more than those who come to hear what you’ve got to say. Many people are paralyzed at the thought of standing up in front of 200 or so strangers, but if you’ll memorize a couple of snappy little poems and get a big satchel of fresh jokes it can be a huge thrill.
Back in the day I found out these booster clubs in the big Southern cities paid at least $1,000 a pop so soon I had wiggled my way into that game. Bolstered by the fact there aren’t that many people who are willing to be a public speaker, you don’t have to be all that good to do it. So the trouble started when I was determined to be better than the guy who was there the week before or the poor sap who would follow me the next week.
I didn’t care who the other speakers were; if I could get a big room of total strangers belly-laughing and high-fiving within 15 minutes I was golden. So I worked hard at it and, just like anything else, you work real hard at anything and, on a day that will come sooner than you think, it’ll turn into hard work.
One year I did almost 25 or 30 talks “for deposit only.” I had a rule that I’d never take a dime if it was “for the glory of God” but back then if you’d give ‘em a chance “the fried-chicken churches” would wear you out.
Oh, you didn’t ever want to turn down “a call from the Lord” but, this is the truth, if you really jacked up the crowd at a Baptist church in Birmingham, by the very next Thursday you’d have more “brothers” calling you than Saint Peter. Trust me, you give away all the milk and soon you can’t feed the cow.
Anyway, I quickly got on a roll, but when you were gone every weekend doing games and then whacked out the better part of two more days during the week – and still tried to do well with your “day job” – the money wasn’t as easy as finding time for the more pressing things in life.
Plus I finally started having bigger trouble with my arm. It all came to a head one morning about 2 a.m. I was driving home when, somewhere down around Gadsden, my ole elbow “popped.” That’s just the nicest way to put it, and suddenly I’m trying to find a convenience store that sold sanitary napkins. It was cold and I was tired and I looked like I had just slaughtered a hog. Are you kidding me?
Well, after I left sports and the newspaper business, I was pretty determined to really shut that door. That was one of the absolutely dumbest mistakes I have made in my life because the friendships I had forged were incredible and, when I abruptly turned my back on such great days of fun, it should have gotten me committed to the “coo-coo house.”
This spring, when it is warm and I am finally feeling a little bit better, I’m already planning my own “When Hell Freezes Over Tour.” I just want to spend some time in Tuscaloosa and Knoxville and Athens and Auburn and other places to thank so many people
for what they once did for me.
And now, if anybody dares ask me to speak, I’ve finally got something that I’m burning to say.
One of the little poems I memorized back then used to serve me just perfectly when I’d go into a town where the home team had just been upset the Saturday before. You’d get to the meeting and everybody would be mad, grousing how sorry the coach was and how the players were all fat and slow, so you had to change the atmosphere pretty quickly to be any kind of success. So here’s what I’d lay on the angry crowd after the first joke or two:
“I saw some men in my home town, some men who were tearing a building down,
“With a heave and a ho and a mighty yell, they swung a beam and a side wall fell.
“I asked the foreman, ‘Are these men skilled? Are they the type you’d have to build?’
“And he laughed and shook his head, saying ‘No, why no indeed - a common laborer is all I need.
“For I can tear down, in just a day or two, what it took a skilled builder ten years to do.”
Well, you say the last line real slow and real dramatic and, my friend, you’ve caught your quarry. Its “low-hanging fruit” from that point on and I used to love that. But, again, now I have a far better story to tell.
I want to tell anybody who’ll listen that if they think they can go it alone in this world they are crazier than a rat at a chemical factory. I want to plead with people to learn the lesson because, brother, the test is going to come one day whether you like it or not.
Lou Holtz used to tell his players that after their glory days were through they could expect at least three crises in their life for every year they lived. Turns out, that may be conservative but, far worse, there may be a real disaster, a major-league tsunami, that will come along and that’s when you better have “a strong rock to tie to.”
Bear Bryant would always tell his players at Texas A&M and Alabama that they needed to learn to “fight.” One day a group of them approached The Old Man, asking him pretty specifically what he was talking about, because to fight in a football game will get you a 15-yard penalty if not completely thrown out of the game.
“You listen to me very closely. The day is gonna’ come when you are driving back to your ranch from town and the banker you had counted on has just laughed in your face because you need some quick help with your mortgage.
“As you get to your place you see your cattle on either side of the road and they are laying there, each one of ‘em dead. But what catches your eye is the smoke rising in the distance so, with your old truck smoking even worse, you race to your farm house to find it pretty much engulfed in flames.
“So you rush to the door, bent on saving anything you can, and there is a note pinned to the screen from your wife, telling you she’s just run off with the town drummer. Well, there you are, 55 years old and fat and bald, and you gotta’ make a decision. Are you gonna’ throw in or are you gonna’ fight?”
That’s when Coach would pause, spitting off those imaginary flecks of his Chesterfierld off his lips, and then saying in that low growl,
“Gentlemen, my trouble is I can’t wait until you are 55 years old. I gotta’ know now. Before we go down to LSU or play Tennessee I gotta’ know one thing. Are you gonna’ fight or are you gonna’ throw in?”
Trust me, I understand more about that today than I ever have in my life. I want to tell any crowd of folks who will listen that they need more than just “fight,”, they desperately need “a strong rock to tie to” before their time comes. I want to tell them it isn’t about a big house or fancy car or ritzy title, not at all. The only thing that really matters are the people you hold in your heart and those who hold you in theirs.
True story: the Golden Gateway Bridge was built in San Francisco in 1937 and, up until this very moment, there hasn’t been a two-week period that has passed that some poor soul hasn’t jumped over the rail. What if, just what if, I could talk to a guy like that? Just give me five minutes.
I want to tell faceless strangers about the hundreds who love me right now because, I‘ll guarantee anyone this, there is at least One who loves each of them every bit as much and probably a whole lot more.
That’s the very best part of all of this. If the crowd is right, I want to tell them about a Living Jesus. Oh I know there are a lot of people who’ll laugh and throw stones at that, especially those who know me best, but let me let you in on what I once thought was a great, big secret; there ain’t enough rocks on this earth to be gathered for what I deserve.
“Mr. Granite” here had to nearly die a couple of times before I “got it,” before I could understand none of that matters, not a bit, because today my slate has been wiped clean. Wait until I tell you what my Jesus used to do it for me. All of my bad marks have been handled. Why on earth would anybody “throw in” knowing that? Don’t you see, that’s my best story of all time. I promise it is. Just you wait until I polish it up and you hear it.
I know today I’ve rambled long. I have also given my oath to the doctors that this time I’m going to do it right, taking my prescribed naps every afternoon, and finally admitting it is going to take a few more months for me to shake what I’ve got. Truth is, I ain’t got a whole lot of choice so it will be yet awhile before I’m ready to venture out and take my “at bat” from a podium. Don’t worry. I’ll be there.
But if you ever wind up in a crowd where I’m fixing to talk, be assured of two things. I now have the best story I’ve ever told in my life and I am going to get a bigger thrill out of telling it than the people will who hear it. That, and I’ll do a better job of getting you back to where you’re going on time.
royexum@aol.com
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