“I used to start your day—now I can’t even get a call back from my kids.”
That’s not a complaint. It’s just a fact. Like the frost on the window this morning, or the silence in the kitchen that used to buzz with the sound of toast popping up and a dog whining for his morning walk. Things change. People move on. The world forgets.
But I remember.
Back in 1979, I sat behind a microphone at 5:00 a.m. every weekday, lipstick already on, coffee gone cold beside my notes. WJRD 610 AM, broadcasting live from a narrow brick building off Highway 47 in Jackson County, Missouri. My voice came through wood-paneled kitchen radios and old Pontiacs stuck in traffic. I was “Mary in the Morning.” That’s what they called me. Someone at the station thought it sounded warm, comforting. Like a sunrise in a coffee cup.
And for a while, it was.
I knew what time the school buses ran, what the farmers needed to hear before heading out, and what song a tired mother needed to feel less alone. My favorite part was the “Letter of the Day”—a listener would send in a little note. Sometimes about their kids. Sometimes about their husband who worked third shift. Sometimes about a pie recipe that “never fails, even with margarine.”
I read them all. With feeling. Because someone had taken the time to write, and I believed that mattered.
That voice—the one you’re reading now in your head—it used to mean something.
My youngest, Clara, once told her high school friends, “My mom’s on the radio,” with pride so bright it made my eyes sting. Now, if I text her, it’s read but not replied. She works in digital marketing. I’m not entirely sure what that is. Something with emails. Ads, maybe. She says it’s busy. Always busy.
My son, Brian, sends pictures of his kids on the Fourth of July. Once a year. Always a group shot, always blurry. I save them anyway.
People say, “Well, they’ve got their lives.” And that’s true. But what am I supposed to do with the rest of mine?
I live in a senior complex now. The kind with pastel-colored doors and a shuttle that takes you to Walgreens if you sign up by Thursday. There’s a community room with a sad piano and half-dead succulents. Bingo on Wednesdays, meatloaf on Fridays. And a little bookshelf by the elevator with yellowing romance novels no one touches.
I brought in my old radio set—real wood, big dials, a sound like warm bread. But there’s nothing on AM anymore. Just static and ghost voices. Once, I heard myself. A rebroadcast, maybe, from some affiliate out in Nebraska. My own voice, thirty years younger, saying: “It’s 6:45 on a snowy Tuesday, and if you’re scraping ice off your windshield, you’re not alone.”
I cried in the laundry room after that.
When you give your life to a sound, a frequency, a connection so invisible and intimate it lives inside people’s kitchens and hearts, you think it will last. But now I walk into stores and they don’t even say “ma’am” anymore. I’m just in the way.
The cashier once asked if I needed help inserting my card. I wanted to say, “I once interviewed Willie Nelson, honey. I can handle a debit machine.” But I just smiled.
Because when you get older, even your stories start to feel like lies. Like you’re exaggerating. Like you made it up.
I tried to make a podcast once. My neighbor’s grandson helped. I recorded a few stories. Told one about a trucker who used to call in every week from different states—Tommy from Tulsa. He’d say, “Keep me company on this dark road, Mary.” And I would.
Another episode was about the Christmas show in ’84, when the power went out and I sang carols live until the generator kicked in. My voice cracked on “O Holy Night,” but no one cared. They said it felt real. Like someone was with them.
I uploaded two episodes. Got eight listens. Then silence. Maybe podcasts need better microphones. Or younger voices.
Or maybe… maybe people don’t want to hear stories from the past anymore. Maybe the world’s just done listening.
Sometimes I sit on the bench behind the building and talk out loud. Just to hear something human.
Yesterday, a young man walked past with headphones in. He looked about twenty, had that half-shaved hair and a little beard. I said hello. He didn’t hear me. Or maybe he did and just didn’t stop.
I wonder what he was listening to. Some murder podcast? Indie music? The news, read by a voice generated by a machine?
I used to be the voice before the news. The one that said, “Here’s what’s good today,” before the headlines made your coffee bitter.
But here’s what I still believe—deep in the part of me that never stopped being “Mary in the Morning.”
Voices matter.
Not the polished ones. Not the AI ones. Not the ones that scream.
But the voices that say, you’re not alone. The ones that say, you’re heard.
Even now, when I call the pharmacy to refill my arthritis meds, and they ask me to “press 1 for English,” I still speak clearly, like someone is listening. Because they might be.
Because someone always was.
Last week, I got a letter in the mail. Not a bill, not a flyer. A real letter.
It was from a woman named Denise. She lives in Kansas City. Said she found one of my old broadcasts online while looking for vintage Christmas music. She wrote:
“I used to listen to you with my mom before school. You read a poem once—something about baking cookies and missing your mother. We both cried. I’m a mom now. I hope I can be that voice for my daughter. Thank you.”
I read it four times. Then I bought stamps. I wrote her back.
That’s the thing about radio. You never knew who was listening. And sometimes, it takes 40 years to find out.
So no, I don’t have a smart speaker. I don’t stream. I still say “tape” when I mean “record.” And when I call my kids and get their voicemail, I leave a message like it’s still 1982:
“Hi honey, it’s mom. Just checking in. No rush. Hope you’re well.”
They don’t call back. But I speak anyway. Maybe someday they’ll listen.
Tonight, I’ll sit with my old radio, turn the dial until it hisses. I’ll close my eyes and pretend I’m on air again. The clock will tick past five. I’ll imagine a mother stirring oatmeal in a quiet kitchen. A trucker adjusting his mirror. Someone alone in a parking lot before the sun rises.
And I’ll say, in my best voice:
“It’s another morning, folks. And you’re not alone—not today. Not ever.”
[If this story stirred a memory or made you feel seen, maybe someone else needs it too.]
