7.29.2013

Kidd Kraddick | 1959-2013


I am a creature of habit and do the same things in the same order most every day. I have a 15 minute bedtime ritual that consists of face washing and teeth brushing and my weekday mornings are no different. Every weekday afternoon around 1pm just as I am finishing lunch, I turn on the podcast of the Kidd Kraddick in the Morning Show on my iPhone.

Their morning show used to be syndicated on a radio station here in Charleston, and I got into the habit of listening to them on my morning commute in 2005. After a few years, the day I turned on my radio and they weren’t there, I immediately turned to their website to see where the heck they went! Turns out that whole station changed hands locally.

Good news though! They have an app and I have an iPhone and so we were reunited once again. I maybe became even closer to the show because I could listen to the entire thing beginning to end without commercials since it would play after the show had previously aired and thus, my favorite afternoon ritual was born. It got me through the hump of the day and made me laugh and made me cry, it is the best radio show I have ever listened to.

I was awakened this past Saturday morning by my husband with a cup of coffee and the news that Kidd Kraddick had passed away the previous day. My husband told me knowing that it would be hard for me to take (he knew how much I loved the show by the amount that I talked about it although he is more of a Howard Stern fan), but I don’t think he expected me to start crying. I didn’t even expect to have that reaction!

When you listen to a show that affects your life every day, when someone shares their life with you for 90 minutes every single day, even if it is one sided, it is going to have an impact. I felt like I knew Kidd and the whole crew. I identified with each of them on different aspects. I would think that I was exactly like Kellie and Jenna’s personalities combined. That Big Al could have been a great friend, I could have been married to J-Si, and that Kidd could have been my dad.

I know it sounds so weird, but I love that cast. When I heard the heartbreaking news, I felt compelled to call them up as if I was their best friend because that is how they made people feel. I felt sad for his family, sadder for the crew, and saddest that this world will be missing out on a very kind and generous man. He didn’t fill the airwaves with sexy time talk, he talked about his charity Kidd’s Kids, about how to be a good person, and he was funny. So damn funny.

I feel a sensation of emptiness this morning. I was able to listen to the show’s brief last memories of him and some clips of his past shows live while it streamed on the internet, and they were all so sad. His crew, no matter their age, had spent most of their adult life working with Kidd. Some for 20 years and some for 5 years, but they were all beside themselves. I can only imagine how they feel if what I am feeling is even a 100th of what their pain is like.

I personally have never felt this type of grief before, for someone I have never met. I imagine it being similar to those who cried for Kennedy? Or Elvis? Or maybe even Cory Monteith from Glee most recently? All I do know is that afternoons will never be the same for me. I don’t know what to listen to now?!? I am hoping I will be able to hear some of the crew together, at new jobs, or otherwise in the future. They are all so talented. Rest in peace Kidd Kraddick, you will be missed! "Keep looking up, cause that's where it all is!"



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From Charleston, South Carolina to your computer. I hope you enjoy. :)