Episode 05: Magic Love
[Insert theme music]
Carolynn: In the last episode Dave and I were twisting in the wind like fall leaves looking for the ground. Fate had dealt us such unexpected sorrow. Sometimes we wondered if it was karma—we were being punished. This only released more tears. We knew it was just life, being lived. Life is messy and unpredictable. In the short time we had been together, we felt we had spent many years together and yet we weren’t married yet. Our divorces were final. Dave clung to me and we both clung to the anticipation of spending the rest of our existence as a team.
Carolynn: Dave came to work in Detroit only to be disappointed. He was so miserable at the local all-news station that I told him to return to California. In my diary I wrote: He had chosen me and if I was in Detroit then that is where he wanted to be. But seeing him come in one morning at 2 am, after working the night shift, not the prized drive home anchor job he had left, and seeing him slumped over with his head in his hands sitting on the side of the bed, I couldn’t bear it. He looked lost. I told him to call his boss and see if he could get his old job back. I said I could quit my job and move to California in a few months after my son finished high school. He called his boss and was told: “Come home son, all is forgiven.” The day he left, the crying resumed. His coming into my life had brought such happiness to me and my children. But now he had to wait for me. We were apart again.
[Insert tape as below]
Male Voice: You and I were made for each other! Remind me to send a thank-you card to GOD! Love forever, Dave
Carolynn: With the sand in the hour glass plummeting downward, we quickly planned a wedding. Long distance, with my Mom’s help, I ordered flowers, found a small venue for our reception, ordered food, found a dress, and booked hotel rooms for a Phoenix wedding at the church where I had been baptized as a baby. On pale, pink paper, I computer printed our wedding invitation for mailing to our family, and a few friends. It read:
ONCE UPON A TIME, there was a handsome marine who fell in love with a beautiful, blond girl after only one kiss. They became engaged. But he was sent overseas to fight an ugly war and not wanting her to suffer greatly in his absence, he asked her to wait for him and they would marry upon his return. She naturally wanted to marry right away. Alas, what were they to do? The marine shipped out and the young girl eventually moved to another state to take a job. At long last, she wrote a poignant letter to her marine expressing her desires and affection. On board ship, the young marine carried the letter around for several days, afraid of what it might say—not wanting to know. He never answered the letter because he never read it. He threw it into the sea. She never wrote again. He continued to carry her picture around with him through the war and occasionally he would look at it. When he returned home he inquired about her. He was told she was married. So, they went their separate ways. They each had children. Then one day, almost thirty years later, they began to correspond and were eventually reunited. They fell in love all over again, grey hair and all! It was magic! They decided to spend the rest of their lives together. They knew they would live happily ever after.
On Sunday, December 31, 1995 at 11:00 a. m. they plan to finally become husband and wife at Faith Lutheran Church, 801 E. Camelback Road, in Phoenix. Their desire is for everyone who loves them to be present for this happy event. Please come and stay to toast to the future happiness of
Carolynn L. Bauer and David R. Zorn at a champagne brunch at the Holiday Inn, 1500 N. 51st Avenue immediately following the ceremony.
[Insert Dave’s vows as below]
Carolynn: Dave wrote the following vows:
Male Voice: “I’ve loved you from the moment I met you. I will love you till the day I die and beyond. I will love you forever. I love you more than life itself. When I am with you, I am as happy as a human being can be. I want to spend the rest of my life with you and be the one to watch over you. If you agree to marry me you will make me the happiest man in the world. Carolynn, will you Please marry me?”
Carolynn: I made a pill box hat to go with my winter white suit and styled my hair just like it was when Dave and I were engaged--a “bob cut.” During the ceremony, our guests sat in the choir section to the side of the altar since they were a small group. It was “church mouse” quiet because we had no music for the ceremony.
Due to the Rose Bowl event that weekend, Arizona florists were short on blooms as most of the fresh flowers went to California to decorate floats, so my tiny bouquet had one gardenia and some ferns. Even though we were adults and each had been married before, we were like two kids as we stood there—scared as well as excited. As Dave was about to say “I do” I saw his face turn pale as I faced him. I feared he would faint. I leaned in and whispered, “breathe, honey” and put my arm around him. I was a little late getting to the church and I guess he feared I wouldn’t show or that something might have happened to me. Earlier, I was having premarital glitters but nothing was going to keep me from that church.
Carolynn: Later we recorded in our taped diary:
[Insert tape about our honeymoon “2nd clip I love you”as below]
Carolynn: And we have so little time together, we’re newlyweds. I don’t want to give up any of my time with Dave. I love him so much. He’s so special. I will always love him.
Dave: I want you to rewind that and make sure it recorded I want to hear that again.
Carolynn: Are you satisfied?
Dave: Ya it’s there alright, (laugh)
Carolynn: Now do you have anything to say?
Dave: Well, I love you very much too. You know that and I’ll say that for the record and for the diary that ah I’ve always loved you, I’ve never stopped loving you, you’re my first love and my last, and ah I would gladly give my life for you and I think I might have to actually.
Carolynn: Laugh, ya that old joke that we’d stop a bullet for each other just might come true.
Carolynn: Since we got married right after Christmas, New Year’s Eve Day, we had to assemble behind the nativity props because they were still up in the center of the church from the Christmas Services. We would tell people we got married in a stable.
[Insert clip April 1st—“well, we got married in a stable. .. .]
Carolynn: We took a quick trip and overnighted in Capistrano in California and then Dave dropped me off at the airport. I had to go back to finish up at work, hire a moving van, and pack up everything I owned. I ended up renting my condo because the sale fell through at the last moment. I finally left for California in April as things were blooming. It was a new beginning for us too.
Carolynn: Dave had secured an apartment for us in Oak Park, California. It had the one thing I said was a must! A kitchen window. We slept on the floor the first night [for the second time] and waited for the moving van which arrived the next day. I looked around and it was good. I was finally with the love of my life after a year and a half of waiting. After over thirty years of waiting, actually. I was greeted with a small earthquake as I unpacked. Welcome to California it said.
[Insert DZ on answering machine]
We settled into our first ten years of marriage, later we’d remember the time in this apartment as some of the happiest years of our marriage. Love grew there along with the avocados.
One day I wrote in my diary: “I tell people that I was the one you, “threw back” or the “one that got away” but that’s because I love to fish. But as I found out, if you throw your line in often enough, you will eventually catch the BIG one. I certainly threw in my line enough, and I not only finally caught the big one, and the only one for me, but one I had caught before.”
[Insert a card and letter read by male voice as below.]
Male voice: “I didn’t know that I would fall in love with you so many times.”
Carolynn: There were many KNX award dinners, many dinner parties with friends and co-workers. Every Easter my oldest daughter would fly out with the grandkids and we went Easter egg hunting. I went back to Detroit every time she had a baby to help her and to visit. My oldest son was in Decatur, Illinois with his wife and daughter, working for ADM. My youngest son was in the Northwest learning to be a baker. He would eventually open a bakery in Durango, Colorado called Serious Delights. My youngest daughter was in Ann Arbor Michigan where she got a Master’s Degree and became a school librarian—now called media specialist, I guess. Dave’s son, also named David, graduated from college and joined his Dad as a broadcast journalist but in Phoenix. He did mostly sports instead of news however.
Dave and I were empty nesters. I was often unwell suffering from fibromyalgia, a diagnosis I had gotten right before leaving for California. Dave sometimes had to help me with the simplest chores. His unconditional love for me was something for the storybooks. A card he sent me said:
[Insert tape as below]
Male Voice: I’ve never been on the covers of Time, Newsweek, or TV Guide, but who cares, as long as I get to be under the covers with you!
Carolynn: And in 2001 we were in a story book. It was called Love Letters of a Lifetime: Romance in America, produced by Lifetime Television. The forward was by Dana Reeve. We were interviewed individually by the editor who collected 25 love stores for the book. While some of the details were not exactly right, it was thrilling to see our story told for the first time in print. Over the years, we told our story of interrupted love to many people. And I would continue to tell it—this Podcast is produced in place of the book I promised Dave I would write.
During this time Dave wrote his book, Dinky Dau: Love, War and the Corps from which I have taken excerpts for this podcast. In it he tells our story too. Here is a clip recorded on tape right after our honeymoon.
[clip I love my wife very much as below:]
Carolynn: I don’t want to talk anyway, I’m tired, he just wears me out what can I say? Somethings never change. Do you have anything more to say?
Dave: I love my wife very much and I couldn’t be happier than I am right now.
Carolynn: Ditto
Carolynn: Dave was sometimes called, “the voice of LA Radio” because he was a well-known all news broadcaster for CBS’s KNX Radio in LA for twenty-five years. Nearly everyone who drove to or from work with the radio on could identify his voice. I got used to hearing it in stores when I was shopping and in the car when I was driving. When our grandson heard it coming out of the car radio on one visit, he wanted to know how PaPa got in there. I joked that that voice was only for the radio, I didn’t get that melodious voice at home. Dave joked that he had a face made for radio, meaning he didn’t think of himself as attractive. He was extremely attractive to me. He wasn’t the geek looking guy with the thick, black, Buddy Holly glasses that I fell in love with, but his heart hadn’t changed and neither had his love for me.
Earlier, when he left to go to WWJ Detroit, to be near me, the staff at KNX gave him a farewell sendoff. I want to share some of the comments on cards he received then, which testify to his talent and beloved nature:
· I admire and respect your talent and tremendous ability but most of all your kind heart. Jill Angel
· You have been a pleasure to work with over the years You are the solid, unflappable steady rock. Jim Thorton
· As I write this, I am so sad I could cry in my chardonnay. It has been a truly wonderful experience working with you. Not only are you one of the most talented journalists around, you are such a special person. Kathleen
· I stand by my statement “the best anchor KNX ever had” Laszlo
· Ever since you did the famous space shuttle landing broadcast in January 1986, I thought you were excellent==a consummate professional. Frank Mottek
· I’ve always said to myself, “when I grow up I want to be like Dave.” Linda Nunez
· You are one of the few true gentlemen I have had the honor ow working with. I learned a lot from you. David Singer
· You’ve been the heart and soul of KNX for so long that your absence will be very keenly felt for a long time. Gail Eichenthal
· You are KNX in ways that no one else is, or could be, again. You are a gentleman, a friend, a broadcaster of the old school, with all the best attributes that implies. Michael Ambrozini
Carolynn: While Detroit’s WWJ management didn’t appreciate Dave’s talent which propelled him to return to his home at KNX, as you just heard, his family at KNX, his colleagues, held him in great esteem. So you can see from these comments, that I am not the only one to appreciate him and to sing his praises.
While life was wonderful, it was not without its challenges. One was with Dave’s ex-wife. At one point early in our marriage Dave wrote the following letter to the staff at KNX:
[Insert: Carolynn reads the letter about the disclosing
of personal information as below]
Divorce is something most of us are familiar with, either directly or through friends or family. As many of you know, I have separated, divorced and re-married.
While I have chosen not to discuss “what went wrong” with my marriage, my ex-wife continues to spend countless hours telephoning my friends, co-workers and family members around the southland, the country and the world to tell them what’s wrong with me. Now she has expanded her campaign of harassment to include my present wife, Carolynn, despite long standing restraining orders. Until now she has been unable to obtain my home phone number or my home address. I don’t know for sure how she got the information but I have good reason to believe it was through someone here at KNX. I know it’s sometimes only hearing one side. However, as journalists, we should know better.
Carolynn: Dave’s letter continues:
Perhaps the disclosure of the information was inadvertent. Perhaps it was out of sympathy, not knowing that she would abuse it. In any event, it has become necessary for me to change my home phone number again. This time, access to it will be “extremely” limited. This is necessary for reasons of personal safety and peace of mind. I don’t know if she has my current address. I hope not since I’ve signed a one-year lease on my present residence. I’d hate to have to move again.
This is all I’ll say about what going on. I hope I’ve been able to convey the gravity of this situation and the need for confidentiality of personal information. To those of you who have given me support through these, the most difficult years of my life, I thank you. Dave
Carolynn: Some of the responses he received from the staff were:
· “Dave, personally I don’t take sides in things like this, unless you’re involved, then I’m automatically on yours! Please tell Carolynn I sympathize and hope it’ll be over soon.”
· “Dave, I know you’ve been really discreet about what’s been happening to you. I respect your privacy, and many times, I’ve wanted to reach out to you, to tell you at the very least, I’m pulling for you, or give you a hug.”
· “Dave, I’ve told my fiancé all these wonderful things about you, both personally and professionally. We would love it if you and Carolynn would join us at our wedding. There will be some knx’ers there (not many, though, I can give you a list) and if for safety reasons, you can’t make it, we truly will understand.”
· “Dave, well, without any overt displays of affection in the newsroom, take this letter as a hug.”
Carolynn: Although close to being perfect, Dave did have cracks in his veneer as we all do. But we had come too far to let the small stuff endanger our future together. We polished the veneer daily. We tried to always talk out our problems. Usually the best,” talking it out,” came through the written word, after all we were both writers. One letter Dave wrote to me after a tiff we had had, showed not a crack in his veneer, so much as, it showed his heartfelt desire to do whatever it took to become a better partner.
[Insert tape from October 2000 with male voice as below]
Male Voice: Carolynn, I thought all day about what you said and, although I know you’ve said it before, it meant more this time. I’m not going to argue with you about what you said. You’re right. You’re always right. I’ve tried so hard to avoid conflict that I’ve created one. I’ve got to stand up for myself and take responsibility. I’ve got to get things done in a timely manner. I haven’t been a very good partner for you. I’ve let you down. I’ve also been a poor father, brother and friend to a lot of people. That too must change. I know it’s been difficult for you living here in California when so much of your life is back in Michigan. I hear it in your voice and see it in your face whenever you talk about it. So my priorities now are to get my life in order in case anything happens to me, you’ll be taken care of. I wouldn’t want to die and have you pissed-off at me for not ensuring your security in your remaining years.
I wouldn’t blame you if you left me and I’m sure no one else in the family would either. Just give me another chance to get things in order before you make your decision. I know my penmanship is lousy but I’m doing the best I can at 1 am in the morning. Love, Dave
Carolynn: And then there are the cards from Dave which I treasure. I saved every one during our time together as you have probably guessed by now. Here are three of them;
[Insert from tapes as below:]
Male Voice: “Who shares with me life’s pleasurers, it’s big and little things. You’re everything there is to me and you always will be too—my friend, my sweetheart and my wife—my one and only you.”
Male voice: “When I think of you, I can see the two of us in my mind, walking hand and hand through the crowed city streets and on quiet country roads, through the forest and by the sea…oh and you’re naked.”
Male Voice: “Who do you call someone who loves you? Me”
Carolynn: Maybe this is a good place to read you my wedding vows to Dave:
“I take you, David Richard Zorn, to be my husband, in every way. I promise to love you, to be faithful to you, to care for you in sickness, and to share all that life will bestow upon us, be it tragedies or blessings, until death parts us temporarily. I also promise to be kind to you, to be a good companion and a joyful partner in life. I pledge to share my body with you willingly and happily as God intended when he created marriage. My desire is to not hinder you in any way from being the best man, the best father, the best employee, the best brother, the best son, the best husband, and the best human being you can and want to be. I want you to love and deeply care for me, protect me, nurture me, be kind to me, and insure that our home is a safe, quiet and loving place for ourselves and our families to enjoy. I pray that God will bless this marriage by granting us many years to enjoy each other and to praise his name.”
Carolynn: Dave was one of the most respected journalists in the radio industry. He started his career in Phoenix after Vietnam and then college winning numerous awards before being hired at KNX-1070 All-News Radio in Los Angeles in 1981. In his career he won 17 awards of excellence from the greater LA Press Club including-- 10 for Best Newscast. He also won 15 Golden Mike Awards from the Southern California Radio/Television News Association including 7 for Best Newscast. He won many awards from the California Associated Press Radio and Television Association and five Mark Twain Awards for Best Radio Newscast in the State of California. He won UPI awards, a Clarion Award and the most prestigious of all broadcast journalism awards, the Dupont Columbia University Silver Baton Award. Besides doing the news, Dave also did documentary series and won two golden Mikes in 2005 for his documentary “40 years from Vietnam” with Ronnie Bradford—both of them Vietnam vets who traveled back to Vietnam to prepare this documentary. Dave was very humble about his success as heard in this taped conversation between us:
[insert clip from tape 1996 Golden Mikes as below:]
Carolynn: “Go for it. You’re on. Testing one, two three…and now the award winning news anchor for KNX, Dave Zorn.”
Dave: Don’t jinx me. Ah, let’s see it…”
Carolynn: You are award winning regardless of what happens. You already are award winning. I tell everybody you are an award winning journalist.”
Dave: I am. But everybody is. Everybody has won something. So, it’s no big thing.”
Carolynn: Even after we were married we continued to record tapes of our activities. I am blessed to have so many recordings of the “voice of LA Radio guy” even though I would tell people that I didn’t get that voice at home. I just got regular, at home Dave.
Carolynn: Then in 2005 another fire season came to Southern California and flames ate the hillside near our apartment like the aftermath of an angry dragon’s oral eruption. We were expecting evacuation orders if it scorched the hill behind us, so Dave stayed home to help me in case we had to make a run for it. But he was a newsman and he couldn’t resist driving out to talk to the firemen and call the radio station with live reports.
[Insert clip of Dave reporting on the fire]
Carolynn: He pulled into the carport shortly after this live report. His car was covered with grey ash, like the rest of the world around our apartment. He walked in the door, crossed the room and unrolled his 6 ft. 2 in body on the new, white loveseat and said, “Call 911. I think I’m having a heart attack.” He was kind of a jokester so I didn’t believe him at first. Then I looked at him, saw his sweating brow and pale face—his look of pain and fear.
Often watching TV I’ve hear the question, “911, what’s your emergency?” But this time it was not on TV, it was real and I was part of the script. I started telling the operator our location and the symptoms Dave was experiencing. Before I finished answering her questions there was a knock on the door and in walked four firemen in full fire-fighting gear, dragging equipment in with them. The entry way was wall to wall with anxious but calm firemen. Because of the fires in the neighborhood, there were fire paramedics on the corner which allowed the quick response. While I stood quietly in the kitchen area watching, they started working on Dave--loosening his clothing, putting in an IV, and hooking him up to an EKG machine. They put a small white tablet of nitro under his tongue. All this time they were grilling me about his medications and health conditions and if he was allergic to anything. At one point Dave said, “I don’t want to die, it’s my grandson’s birthday.” I knew Dave was remembering that his mom died on his birthday, which was also the date that President Kennedy was shot.
I stood to the side, out of thei way, and answered as if I was defending my thesis to my professors: providing answers in a calm, salient, and thorough rendering. Trancelike, I played my role as I had seen many women on nighttime television series enact their scripts. However, there were no tears or hysteria because it was not real to me yet. I was in a movie. Furniture was moved, packed boxes put aside and the EKG reading hitched a ride to the hospital via our land line.I heard one of the guys say, “MI.” I knew what that meant. Dave’s heart attack was confirmed. About that time a paramedic supervisor, Big John, as he was called, rushed in. He had a state of the art 12 lead EKG machine. The only one in the fire department in Ventura County where we lived. It was able to pinpoint exactly where the blockage was thereby alerting the hospital to the emergency coming in. Dave’s LAD (left arterial descending artery), “the widow maker” as it is called, was 100% blocked. Before I could even finish giving his medical history, he was being wheeled out the door. He grabbed my hand and said, “I love you, sweetheart.” Sweetheart was what he always called me, never Carolynn.
I gathered up my purse, my cell phone and charger, a book, and a candy bar as I heard the sirens fade down the street. Through experience, I had a checklist in my head of what I needed for an overnight stay in the hospital. But I had trouble getting out the door because the neighbors were gathered on the porch and they started beseeching me with questions mostly asking if an evacuation order had been issued, because of seeing all the commotion and the fire trucks around our unit. I recited what had happened as if “I “ was reporting the news. No crying, no emotional outburst, no shaky voice from a stunned wife. I didn’t believe that my husband might die. He had a heart attack but was stable as he left under the care of the paramedics. I was sure he’d be ok.
Before I could lock the door, the phone started ringing. It was the KNX station manager asking if Dave had another update for them. I told him, “Dave is on his way to the hospital. He had a heart attack, so no, there won’t be any more fire updates.”
The air smelled like a campfire as I finally climbed into my ash decorated Taurus wagon. Grey flakes floated into the front seat when I opened the door and I had to use the window wipers to clear the windshield. The grey windblown flakes foretold the grey days which would follow. Still calm, I headed to the local hospital. I didn’t know that my husband was about to die.
[Insert Barbershop tag: Never Go Away]
Carolynn: In the next episode, which I call, LOVE LIFE, my heart skips a beat but not as many times as Dave’s heart does. It was not a movie any more, it was real.
Carolynn: Many thanks again to my friend for voicing some of Dave’s notes to me. Thank you to the KNX family for their heartfelt comments when Dave left LA for Detroit. Thanks to the Barbershop Harmony Society for the tags used in most of my episodes.
[music fade-in and out under the clip below]
[Insert clip as below]
Male Voice: Yesterday I smiled 13,647 times. Hey, that’s the same number of times I thought of you!