You know his voice, the somehow smooth nasal lilt that caresses millions of ears each weekday afternoon during All Things Considered, the voice that massages confidence and instant intelligence into every listener's temporal lobes. The steady, measured cadence of Robert Siegal. He sits, tonight, in a padded black rotating chair, shifting this way and that, watching huge screens lining two walls of NPR's Studio 4-A. His white dress shirt is rakishly disheveled, sleeves rolled several inches up his forearms.
I stand, just two feet from him, as he grabs a stiff sheet of copy paper from a file box and reads it on air. I'm one of twenty bloggers from across the country invited to spend election night in the bowels of NPR's Headquarters in Washington, D.C. I arrive just moments before Kentucky is called for McCain. Siegal leans close to his mic and announces McCain's eight electoral votes, then three for Obama as Vermont is added to the tally.
NPR's announcers handle breaking news in a curious mix of old school style and high technology. Siegal's copy paper is typed, sometimes handwritten, an aide tells me - a decidedly un-digital script. Every square inch of the room is filled with intention, with steady-eyed engineers mixing sound to decibel perfection, with web specialists writing and updating web content to reflect the quickly changing election map. There is precious little room to stand, to watch.
Nina Totenberg sits in the same mid-sized room, her eyes glued to a computer screen. She doesn't notice the bustle surrounding her. Her perfectly coiffed hair doesn't move even as she leans closer to the electronic results. She wears a gray body-hugging dress the color and fuzzy texture of the studio walls. An NPR worker tells me that the walls are specially padded to deaden sound, their curving corners designed to collect cough, tick, rustle of paper and suck it into nothingness.
The amount of people in the room - the amount of sheer NPR celebrity - is staggering considering its size. Despite a constant stream of almost-running personnel, all this visitor hears is Siegal's soothing commentary. As each state is called, small smiles accent the room, but no voice gives way to overt emotion. These people understand the basic precept of journalism: relay the information, the truth, in an impartial manner. Let the listener decide.
Two floors up, in a small room overlooking Massachusetts Avenue, NPR President Kevin Klose addresses twenty people in a tiny, packed room. NPR has just begun closed-captioning for audio audiences, the first program of its kind in the nation. A young woman signs his words for the hearing impaired in the audience. Klose wears a navy blue suit though the hour is late. His face is lined, translates a mix of exhaustion and gratitude. He claps for his workers, for the people who made radio truly available for everyone. He claps long and loud.
I sit at a long table in a rectangular room just a few feet away from Studio 4-A. My fellow bloggers are gathered to live-blog the election. Our table is strewn with power cords, empty cans of Diet Coke and Sprite, black plastic plates coated in brownie crumbs, in half-eaten chicken tortilla wraps. I forget where I am and look for green chile to splash on my sandwhich, but none is to be found. Three televisions flash coverage from CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. A huge projection screen houses NPR's official election map. We're like Totenberg - our eyes are drawn to our screens. Hearty discussion about whether different calls are valid punctuate the talking heads' banter.
Sitting across the table from me is NPR's Andy Carvin, NPR's senior product manager for online communities. He's organized this event - invited bloggers, coordinated a dizzying array of snackage - from tiny bite-sized brownies to huge trays of sliced red peppers, zucchini, carrots, and celery - as well as helped each of us keep abreast of NPR's late-breaking news. Carvin keeps close a chart showing what time each state's polls close, keeps one hand on his keyboard as he sends frequent updates to his Twitter account. His brown t-shirt translates his emotion better than his face. As Obama takes another state, I see his shirt quiver, the quickening of his breath.
It's only 10 p.m. and it looks like Obama will sweep the election. I'm hanging in here, as late as it goes. Alaska's polls close last, at 1 a.m. Washington D.C. time. No way will I fall asleep. I've got Robert Siegal's voice to keep me company...
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Comments: 12
Kudos to NPR for inviting the blogosphere, and to Gather for sending you.
I turned off the TV last night and just followed your blog. It conveyed all the excitement and left out the noise.