Have scissors. Will cut.

We are a well greased machine, Mariane and I. 

We meet every Tuesday morning at 8 o'clock sharp at the front door to WLRN, Miami's public radio station to read on air to the visually impaired..  Two copies of the day's Miami Herald are waiting for us, placed there by "our leader", Mario Lozado, the head of the station's Radio Reading Services. Without missing a beat, we take our preferred seats before the not-yet-live microphones and start the process of cutting up the newspapers into four 15 minute segments:  Local  / Regional, State & National / Editorial & Opinion Columns / Business, Sports & Health.

We go live at 9 sharp, so that first hour is used not just to select articles to be read, but to cut and chop them to a readable size. . .in other words, we edit.  And I have to admit, we have our own biases as we do so.  Since time is limited for each segment, we tend to read the articles that (1) will hopefully appeal to the mature age of most of our listeners, and (2) more than likely, will be something that happens to particularly interest us.  A good example was this morning's sizable article on The Heat Repeat!.  If you are not a Heat fan, you might not understand.

Since we never actually see or hear from our listeners, I always wondered if anyone was really listening.  Out of curiousity, I queried my friend, Virginia Jacko, the CEO of the Lighthouse For The Blind.  Her response: "Are you kidding!  I can't tell you the number of people who depend on listening to all you readers."   Makes volunteering worthwhile, doesn't it?

An unexpected benefit of these Tuesday morning sessions is a delightful new friend.  We may be of different generations, but we get along famously, not to mention that I am Godmother to young Leo Pantin-Parish, the newest member of Mariane's family, who recently sat for his portrait.  (See photo.  OK, so I am showing off.)

WLRN could use some additional readers, I'm told.  If you're interested, call Mario at 305-995-2218.  I promise  you, you won't be sorry.
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Photo captions:  Mariane, ready to go "live" and Leo The Lionhearted