New Beginnings

Our program's very first broadcast. Prologue: Ira talks with Joe Franklin, host of the longest running talk show in television history, to get advice for his new radio show. (6 minutes) Act One: After he goes to Jerusalem and sleeps on what is supposedly the very spot where Jesus was crucified, Kevin Kelly has a revelation: that he should live the next six months as if he would die at the end of them. So he gives away nearly everything he owns, and tries to live each day as if his death is imminent — which turns out to be a great challenge. This story was eventually used in a much later program, Shoulda Been Dead. At the time of this interview, Kevin Kelly was executive editor of Wired magazine. Now he's a contributing editor there, and also runs the Cool Tools website. (23 minutes) Act Two: Ira calls his parents Shirley Glass and Barry Glass in Baltimore to ask them for advice about his new radio show. (7 minutes) Act Three: When filmmaker and performance artist Lawrence Steger found out he was HIV positive, he was just about to go out on across country road trip with a friend of his. (13 minutes) Act Four: Ira talks with Ed Ryder, who was wrongly imprisoned for twenty years and recently released. The whole time Ryder was in prison, he dreamt of starting up a band. Now, out of prison, he's done just that. Ira asks him if music means different things to him now that his future is more his own. We replayed his rendition of "God Bless the Child" in the show Lockup. (9 minutes)