In 1998 I spent my summer as a Hollywood extra.

Every day brought a different ridiculous assignment.

On Monday I danced in my swim trunks for the movie She’s All That. On Tuesday I enjoyed a romantic dinner with an older woman on the The Love Boat. On Wednesday I graduated high school with the cast of Boy Meets World.

And man did it pay well. $40 a day! Unless of course they threw water on you or humiliated you in some other fashion, in which case you could request a bump to $50. The whole summer was absurdly hilarious. But nothing could match what happened on the set of the hit ABC sitcom Home Improvement.

It was teen heartthrob Jonathan Taylor Thomas’ final episode and his character was boarding a plane to Costa Rica while Tim Allen and the rest of his family said goodbye.

Wardrobe handed me a Hawaiian shirt and props handed me a plane ticket and the assistant director said that when they called “ACTION!” I needed to cross the set, give my ticket to the gate agent, then walk toward the imaginary plane and wait for them to yell “CUT!”

What could go wrong?

Well, a lot.

Because just as we’re about to do the first take in front of the live studio audience, another extra walks up to me and says, “So what’s our backstory?”

I stared back blankly. “What do you mean?”

“Why are we going to Costa Rica?” he asked.

I of course hadn’t thought about how my character’s journey played into the larger H.I.U. (Home Improvement Universe).

He didn’t wait for me to come up with something. “We’re best friends and we’re going on a surf trip,” he declared.

I nodded. That made sense. I mean they had given me a Hawaiian shirt.

“But really we’re more than surfers,” he continued. “We’re also pranksters. And so when we get to the gate, I’m going to switch tickets with you to confuse the agent. And then we can cross our hands back and forth a few times to make it extra funny.”

That did seem funny but it also made me nervous. This was not how extras behaved on The Love Boat.

“Trust me,” he promised. “This will be great.”

This person I did not know was very confident about this plan. And in his defense, the cast did seem sad from having to bid farewell to Jonathan Taylor Thomas after 8 seasons. Maybe what the moment needed was the levity that only two surfer-pranksters could bring.

“All right,” I said, my heart quickening as the audience quieted. “Let’s go for it.”

From a nearby director’s chair came a booming voice. “Ready… and… ACTION!”

We made our way to the gate. My friend held out his ticket to the agent then quickly traded it with mine. Then we moved onto the crossing arms gag. We hadn’t practiced this move but we were completely in sync. It seemed like my entire career as a non-speaking background actor had been building to this transcendent moment.

Naturally, the extra playing the gate agent didn’t know about our plan, but that just added to the realism as she tried to grab our tickets while we, like wizards, kept them away from her. Finally, sensing Jonathan on our heels, we handed her the correct tickets and disappeared down the gate.

“CUT!”

Obviously we nailed our part so I was a little surprised when the director marched past Tim Allen and made a beeline toward us.

He practically pinned us against the wobbly wood wall of the airport set. “What was that?” he asked.

Suddenly my friend—the guy who five minutes ago thought he was the Daniel Day-Lewis of extras—went silent.

“Well…” I stammered. “You see, he and I are surfers and—”

“JUST GIVE HER THE DAMN TICKETS!” he barked.

I was mortified. And crestfallen. That’s when I learned the rub of being an extra. Doing your job well means that you’re never actually noticed.

And, really, isn’t that one of our biggest fears? To exist… but not really. To float through the world making no discernible impact on anything.

I confess that some days I still feel like an extra, even now. But then I remember the vital roles I’ve been given. As a dad. As a husband. As a writer of stuff that makes people laugh and stirs up souls.

There are juicier parts out there. Fame and fortune. A life in the spotlight. But maybe all the meaning and adventure a person could possibly want is hiding right in front of us.

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When I waved to him as he stepped out of a Monday morning lecture, he was shocked. We hugged. Then I saw the gears start turning in his head. He was running through how my unexpected arrival would affect the next three days of his life. At lunch he was scanning his calendar and firing off texts.

Only later did I realize my son was busy excusing himself from events that no longer seemed important and making sure I could come with him to the ones that still were.

For a whirlwind couple of days, he kindly weaved me into his college life. He gave me a personal high-speed tour of the school’s art museum, complete with stops at Andy Warhol and Claude Monet and a bust of Augustus and some ancient Egyptian pottery. We dropped in on his friends’ dorms and he introduced me like I was actually cool. Best of all, I got to rehearse—in uniform!—with the school band as they prepared for their Saturday halftime show. I played the all-important cow bell.

Here I went to surprise my kid and, honestly, my kid ended up surprising me.

The night before I left he hung out in my hotel room till long after midnight. We watched a Dodgers game and he caught me up on the last three months. It was all the things a dad could want.

A busy life doesn’t leave much room for spontaneity. But every once in a while, doing something crazy is absolutely the right decision. When those opportunities come, make sure you say yes.

And be ready to add some more cow bell.

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Your teacher gave me this blank piece of paper and encouraged us to write our children a note on Back-to-School Night. So I figured this was as good a time as any to tell you that you’re not my actual son.

Seven years ago, when you were barely a toddler, your father mugged me on the streets of New Haven, Connecticut. As he pointed a gun at my head and I begged for mercy, he told me that he would spare my life if I pretended to be your father. It seemed like a good deal and I took it. And when I went to the address he provided to pick you up, I met your lovely mother.

Well, I assumed she was your mother. But funny enough it turns out she wasn’t your actual mom but a woman who had also been mugged by your father a few months earlier and took a similar deal.

Now I understand this is a lot to take in on a Thursday morning while you’re sitting at your 4th grade desk and classmates are reading trivial notes from their actual parents. But if it makes you feel any better, your fake mother and I did soon hit it off, and ultimately we fell in love. We even had a child of our own, your step-brother Alistair.

You don’t remember Alistair, of course, because around this time your father returned and wanted to take you back, having been rehabilitated at Hartford State Prison. When we refused to hand you over, he quickly became un-rehabilitated and threatened our lives again with a baseball bat he had hidden behind his back.

This was when we made the difficult decision to give away Alistair instead of you. Frankly, even at that young age, it was obvious that Alistair did not have your keen intellect or your same smooth tempoed golf swing, and as a long-term investment, your fake mother and I decided that you were more likely to succeed than he.

I suppose what I’m trying to say, William, in a very roundabout way, is that I’m very proud of you and I’m excited for this new school year.

Love Always, “Dad”

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Named in memory of a New York City fire captain who died battling a ship fire a year earlier, the fireboat John J. Harvey was launched in 1931. At one hundred and thirty feet long, with seven internal combustion engines, it was the largest and fastest fireboat ever built.

For sixty-five years the Harvey protected New York Harbor, battling the port’s biggest blazes: the Cunard pier fire of 1932, the SS Normandie fire of 1942, and the El Estero ammunition ship fire during World War II.

But in 1994, after six decades of service, with the Harvey no longer considered big, fast, or useful, it was pulled from the harbor and sent to the scrapyard.

And there it sat for five years.

Until Huntley Gill comes along.

A talented NYC architect, Huntley quite openly prefers things over people. While some consider him an eccentric artist with the bad habit of collecting junk, in truth he has the gift of seeing beauty and value where others can’t.

And so when he stumbles on the Harvey in 1999, it is love at first sight. When he hears that it is going to be auctioned for scrap, he has to have it.

But Huntley is broke. Or at least too broke to buy an old fireboat. And so he does what any man in love might do: he borrows his architecture firm’s elite client list and corrals whoever he can to come and hear a crazy pitch. Over drinks—a lot of drinks—Huntley proves to be relentless.

“Any rich guy can own a Ferrari,” Huntley argues. “But how many people can own a piece of history?”

New York real estate broker Chase Welles is swayed—and swaying—and joins in for a blind bid of $27,100, having heard another group of investors are bidding $27,000.

It turns out the next highest offer… is only $10,000.

Whoops. But also… so what! Huntley Gill has his piece of history.

Unfortunately, after five years in dry dock, nothing on this rusty boat actually works. And if they can’t make the thing seaworthy, they will never recoup their investment.

Frustrated, Huntley heads to New Jersey—home to working class mariners happy to take advantage of Upper West Siders with deep pockets. As usual, Huntley doesn’t beat around the bush.

“The pay is horrible but the boat is special,” he explains.

The workers scatter. All except for one. “How special?” one of them asks.

This is Tim Ivory. Tim is a gifted greaser with dyslexia who taught himself to read using the manual to his ’51 Buick Roadmaster. And from the moment he agrees to help rehabilitate Huntley’s relic, he only cares about one thing: What’s in the best interest of the boat?

While taking the Harvey to meet a rich widow, the fragile boat springs a leak. Tim insists they turn back but Huntley wants to keep going. “She might write us a big check!” Huntley yells.

Tim fires back: “Not if the boat’s at the bottom of the harbor!”

To make things worse, as the list of repairs and bills pile up, the dot-com bubble bursts. Chase Welles panics and wants to sell. Huntley refuses. “From now on the work will have to be done by volunteers,” he declares.

One of those volunteers is Jessica DuLong.

The daughter of an auto mechanic, Jessica fled her blue collar upbringing for a Stanford education and a sexy job at a start-up in the Empire State Building. She volunteers to help Huntley on a whim, but the manual labor ignites a part of her she didn’t know was there. After just one day with the fireboat, she’s exhausted, covered in grease, and inspired.

When Jessica’s start-up tanks in early 2001, Huntley offers her the job of assistant engineer. Tim the mechanic can’t believe what he’s hearing.

“The girl?” Tim says. “She can’t even reach the valves!”

Huntley waves off Tim’s fears. “Please, any monkey can do this!”

Jessica knows that isn’t true. This would be one of the most physically demanding jobs she’s ever done. Naturally, she says yes.

At last, the Harvey is fixed. It’s also deeply in debt. Paying passengers could fix that, but no one is allowed on until the boat passes a test run under the watchful eye of the Coast Guard. And on Huntley’s first attempt, everything that could go wrong does, including a fire that the crew—ironically—can’t extinguish.

The Harvey’s certification is rejected.

Chase Welles is out of patience.

And Huntley Gill is forced to sell.

But before he can end his expensive love affair with the Harvey, a burly man in his mid-60’s climbs aboard. He wanders from deck to deck, then makes his way slowly up to the pilot room.

“Can I help you?” Huntley asks.

“I used to work on this boat,” the man said.

“Oh yeah. What did you do?”

“I was the captain.”

This man is no other than Bob Lenney. A graduate of the Merchant Marine Academy, an FDNY legend, and boss of the Harvey for thirty-one years.

Bob’s knees are shot, and he’s as salty as they come, but Huntley needs him.

“Any chance you’ll take your old job back?” Huntley asks.

Bob looks at the rag tag crew. “With these clowns? Maybe one last ride.”

With the Harvey’s captain at the wheel, Huntley convinces the Coast Guard to give them one more chance.

This time the boat passes. And Bob decides to stay.

The Harvey is in business. With a full schedule of field trips, weekend adventures up the Hudson River, and late night water displays around Manhattan, Huntley chips away at his debt and forges a bond with his misfit crew. When they bump into a boss from the FDNY, they even offer to help with any actual fires they might come across.

The idea is met with a scoff. “Don’t even joke about that,” he tells them.

And then…

Huntley had worked late the night before and unplugged his phone. He only wakes up when Chase Welles bangs on his door.

In a flash, they are fighting their way to the Harvey tied up on Pier 63.

Tim hitches a ride on a boat from Jersey.

Without a plan, but pulled to help like countless other, the crew pushes off, turns south… and watches as the North Tower collapses.

The Harvey’s radio crackles with a desperate Coast Guard plea: “ALL AVAILABLE BOATS.”

As they reach downtown, they see panicked New Yorkers leaping into the cold harbor. Tim ties the boat to a tree along the seawall. They overload the Harvey with survivors and shuttle them to safety across the Hudson.

Over 500,000 people in total are evacuated by water that morning. It is the single largest boat lift of people in world history. Bigger than Dunkirk.

But the heroics of the Harvey have just begun.

Because downtown New York has no water. The World Trade Center collapse has severed all water lines. Infernos rage, and the surviving firefighters have nothing to fight with.

When the Harvey returns after unloading survivors, the same FDNY boss who’d brushed them off a few months earlier is waiting for them at the seawall. “Do your pumps work?” he asks.

Huntley looks to Tim, who gives him a thumbs-up. Yes, their pumps work. What they don’t know is how many of the Harvey’s ancient hose valves they can actually hammer open.

Just three.

That won’t be much help. But Huntley eyes the brass water guns on the deck, the ones they use to douse the third graders on hot days.

They unscrew the tips and measure the valve threads underneath them. They’re a perfect fit. They screw in the hoses, then watch as the FDNY runs them from their humble fireboat and into the dense smoke.

Tim finds a piece of sidewalk chalk and, despite his dyslexia, draws a complex diagram on the wheelhouse to remind himself which hose line is leading to what part of downtown New York City.

Then he turns on the pumps. Within seconds, the Harvey is feeding 18,000 gallons of water a minute from New York Harbor to the flames at Ground Zero.

With the help of this amateur volunteer crew, the fireboat John J. Harvey pumps water for 48 STRAIGHT HOURS.

More than 50 MILLION GALLONS.

On September 13th, when they’re finally given the okay to power down, our crew takes a walk. Bob. Tim. Jessica. They follow the hose lines through the haze… and into the heart of Ground Zero.

They see the horror. But they also see buildings still standing. And first responders still rescuing… in no small part because of a 70-year-old fireboat that had one more miracle in it.

Together, the crew rides home in silence.

The experience is too weighty for words. But as Pier 63 comes into focus, they see something. A crowd. Volunteers and friends and investors who no longer doubt how priceless this old boat really is.

Which brings us back to Huntley Gill. When he bought the boat he knew it would be fun to own a piece of history. But as he laughs and cries with his crew, passing drinks and telling stories, the deeper personal value of the Harvey becomes evident. Because Huntley didn’t really need a fireboat. What he really needed was a family.

And somehow, with all its dysfunction and brokenness and heartache and beauty, the fireboat John J. Harvey gave him one. Maybe even the best one. And that, in the wake of 9/11, was the most precious gift of all.

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LINKS:

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Saved at the Seawall by Jessica DuLong

Jessica DuLong on CBS Sunday Morning:

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Sit back and enjoy “Darryl the Magnificent,” Episode #10 of The Silver Cord Stories Podcast.

• “Darryl” on Spotify

• “Darryl” on Apple Podcasts

To catch all of Bob’s stories and podcasts, become a subscriber here.

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If you enjoy this, the best way you can say thank you is to share with others and become a subscriber! Paid subscribers to SILVER CORD STORIES receive a signed copy of my new book—FOR FREE!

SHOW NOTES:

• “Now I Know Where Babies Come From” on Silver Cord Stories

• The Silver Cord now available on Amazon

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My dad never liked the idea of Take Your Kid to Work Day.

It wasn’t that he didn’t like me, it was the blending of his two spheres of influence that bothered him. He would never think to invite a mech…

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If you’re receiving this letter, it’s because you have made the list of potential guests to Taylor Swift’s secret summer wedding. CONGRATULATIONS!

In order to make the FINAL guest list, please read A…

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Actor Eric Nenninger (Mad Men and 100 other things) channels his inner trucker to bring this moody tale to life in a way only a true talent can.

Listen. Share. Or click the link below and read along.

Enjoy.

Last May I posted a photo of teenagers crawling through the desert and said I was taking a lucky group of high schoolers to Death Valley without water in order to give them something good to write about in their Common App college essay.

Pretty soon the reel had over a million views and my inbox had a flurry of requests from teens who genuinely wanted to be included.

Unfortunately for them, this is satire. But just barely.

Enjoy!

SHOW NOTES:

• “Cruel Summer” on Silver Cord Stories

• Silver Cord Stories on Instagram

• The Silver Cord now available on Amazon

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It was a musical about a vampire boy band. Don’t laugh. It was actually awesome and if you come to my house I will screen you the only copy in existence.

The boy band had already been cast but what we needed was an actor to play their manager. We saw a lot of famous faces but only one stood out: Eric Nenninger.

If you’ve watched any TV in the last 20 years, the odds of you missing Eric are statistically impossible.

Eric’s credits include Malcolm in the Middle, Mad Men, The Rookie, Big Bang Theory, Wet Hot American Summer, The Politician, The Flash… and that’s just scratching the surface.

Eric is funny and smart and a total pro. I’ll never forget during rehearsals on the pilot where our director Adam Stein gave the cast an acting exercise. He pulled a random line of dialogue from the script and asked everyone to deliver it in as many different ways as possible. Long after everyone else had run out of line readings, Eric just kept going. And going. And going. It was like a magic trick.

So when Eric agreed to come on the podcast and perform a Silver Cord Story, I shouldn’t have been surprised when he said, “Can I do two stories?” (He has since told me he’s doing a third whether I like it or not.)

You’ll have to wait for the others, but for now, sit back and enjoy Eric Nenninger… performing “Softie.”

SHOW NOTES:

EricNenninger.com

Eric Nenninger on IMDB

The Silver Cord on Amazon

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“RUSH HIRE. Executive Assistant. Kaboom Aerospace. 9am. ONE DAY ONLY. Kaylee, are you available???”

Kaylee was available.

At thirty-one and sin…

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Every few weeks, I’m recording and releasing an audio version of one of my original stories.

“Factory Reset” came out early last year, but since my readership has grown 750% since then (thank you!) it seemed worthy of being re-released this week and now recorded for all to hear!

As promised, some TBA talented friends will soon be reading their own favorite Silver Cord Stories in the weeks to come.

So stay tuned — and thanks for listening.

THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY:

Some of the best story ideas come from just asking, “What if…”

In this case, my old cell phone had been warning me over and over that it was dangerously low on storage. As a writer, rather than fix the problem, instead I asked, “What if someone received a notification that their brain was running out of room and a tech company offered to clear up some space? What’s the worst (and best?) that could happen?”

With that, I was off to the races.

For access to all my stories, subscribe for free at silvercordstories.com.

And buy THE SILVER CORD, now on sale:

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