Summer camp, business trips, weddings, moving a child from Tennessee into Illinois, productions of 1776, and two days of skate punk made the months of June and July too busy for all three cast members to commit to a regular recording schedule. With nothing else to fill a programming void, Rodney sat down without his castmates and had a fascinating conversation with an author local to the Rockford area. Unfortunately, Rodney did not know how to use Zoom, which means that conversation never got recorded. Thankfully, the subject of his interview was unfazed enough to come back on another day and be interviewed for a second time. This time, Rodney was armed with instructions from Aaron on how to, you know, push the button that says “record.”
Rodney’s interview is with a man named Andrew Mertzenich. Native to the Rockford area, Andrew is a practicing lawyer, an accomplished musician, the co-chair of the Rockford Area Pride Committee, founder of the city’s annual Pride parade, and now a published author. His book — entitled Forest City Yester-Queer — is a meticulously-researched chronicle of the LGBTQIA+ community in the Rockford, Illinois area. His stories are fascinating. He is also incredibly patient to record the same interview twice. That last sentence there is one final dig at Rodney. Unnecessary, yes, but we can’t help ourselves.
To hear the interview, press PLAY on the media player below.
Just In Case We Die 