Jimmy Carter and Me

A Story in Two Very Distinct Parts

A mural in memory of Jimmy Carter is painted on a storefront at the Jimmy Carter National Historic Park in Plains, Georgia, on December 30, 2024.

Part 1

You live to 100 and you make a mark. You do so having been president of the United States and the tributes pile up. It’s inevitable. And heartwarming.

Naturally, many people around the world owe a great debt to Jimmy Carter: Americans of every stripe, for his honesty, empathy and simple decency. The nations of Israel and Egypt, thanks to his negotiations at Camp David, have enjoyed decades of fragile peace. The thousands of disadvantaged Habitat for Humanity beneficiaries, who had homes built or renovated, free of charge, thanks to Carter’s high-profile hammer-wielding efforts. Nations of the world, who relied on his post-presidential diplomacy to forge agreements amid intractable disputes. In fact, as all the obituaries have noted, Carter had a much better post-presidency than he had a 4-year stint in the White House. He won the Nobel Peace prize and the admiration of the world.

But if we’re counting his extraordinary achievements as humanitarian without portfolio, you should know this: nobody owed him like I did.

Pinky swear. This is a bit of a saga. In fact, it’s a saga plus a coda, which is almost as startling as the preposterous story it follows. If you wish for a more vivid retelling, I strongly advise you to go to this place, and hear it in long form, as it was recorded for NPR’s All Things Considered about 35 years ago. (Click on “Tag, You’re It” parts one and two. You will not regret it.)

But the short, text version is this: I was headed to Nashville for a speaking engagement. For some reason, I’d be there for two or three days. I don’t recall why. Maybe it involved air schedules or the tides. But it occurred to me that, as long as I was in Music City, I might as well write a hit country song. And while I was at it, why not write a tune that would reflect not just traditional country tropes and themes, but also my own self-important, Washington, D.C., inside-the-beltway, semi-Jewy experience.

Now I am no musician. (In school they tried to teach me the recorder, which I used as a percussion instrument.) So I enlisted the help of a real-life country singer-songwriter, Rivers Rutherford, to collaborate with me on the project. This wasn’t something we were going to just dash off. When we eventually met, we devoted almost an entire business day.

After quite a few false starts, with Rivers on guitar and me on the sofa, we alighted on a concept that filled the bill: a song about regret over a relationship under duress, but also about the very modern problem of depending on technology to close the gap created by diverging lives. (“They say our ship is sinking, but the metaphor ain’t right. We’re not ships; we’re microchips, passing in the night.”)

Thank you. Thank you very much.

The song, in short, became about phone tag. The chorus was this:

Tag you’re it. Catch me if you can.
I wanna say I love you, but I’m such a busy man.
I know we’ll see each other; it’s just a question when,
I’m calling you but I can’t get through so try me back again.

Once again, I’d show you all the lyrics, but this is something you really need to hear with your own ears. The song, to paraphrase the great Patsy Cline, is catchy as all fuck.

The next step was to head to Music Row and perform it for the executives at Sony records. I gave some thought to getting myself some lizard boots and a big ol’ black cowboy hat, but I stuck with my khakis, crew neck sweater and penny loafers. The day before I’d run into former governor Lamar Alexander and asked him for advice, and he insisted on authenticity. “Just be yourself,” he said. That made sense, although when I met the country-music tastemakers, I didn’t tell any long, tedious jokes.

Cutting to the chase here: they passed on “Tag, You’re It.” That was a blow. On the plus side, my speech at the famed Ryman Auditorium — home of the Grand Ole Opry — went very well. Rivers even performed the song and the crowd loved it. But still the next day I was flying back to Washington empty handed, fame-and-untold-richeswise.

I flew to my speaking gigs first class, as did a lot of people much more important than me. One of them sat in the seat directly across the aisle. It was Jimmy Carter. He’d been in Nashville promoting his latest book, and the fates had contrived to place me inches away from the man who was the very apotheosis of combined traditional country values and inside-the-beltway urgency. I grabbed my recording gear, and asked if he’d be willing to listen to my song. “Sure,” he said. “In a little bit. I have to visit some folks in the back of the plane.”

He did just that, as I nervously gulped coffee. One after the other. Finally, just before takeoff, Carter returned. I switched seats with his Secret Service guy, handed the president my headphones and watched him listen to “Tag, You’re It.” He was smiling his famous toothy smile and tapping his foot, which I regarded as hopeful signs. Sure enough, when he’d listened through, he handed me the headset and said, “I liked the song. I’d like to hear it on my local country music station now and then. And I liked the performer, but Wille Nelson is a good friend of mine … .”

Wille Nelson, ladies and gentlemen.

Shame is not my strongest suit, so I instantly asked Carter if he’d connect with Willie about possibly singing “Tag, You’re It.” He agreed.

Me: “With your compliments?”
Former Leader of the Free World: “Of course.”
Me: “See you at the Country Music Awards, Mr. President.”

All right, I never did get to the awards show. I probably had a previous engagement. But my two-part saga about “Tag, You’re It,” featured on All Things Considered for something like 5 million listeners, culminated in a rendition fronted by the legendary [CLICK HERE, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD]. No fame or riches were to come of it, but something else did.

Part 2

What happens when you have six cups of coffee in the space of two hours? Not a trick question. What happens is you eventually need relief.

Having engineered possibly the most astonishing climax in the entire history of self-indulgent public-radio feature reporting, and as our 737 gradually descended on our initial approach to Washington National Airport, nature called. Loudly. Nature was shouting: “Yo, Country Bob, LAVATORY!”

It was not subtle. So I got the attention of the flight attendant and mimed my urgent need for the rest room. So I could, you know, rest. She nodded and mouthed, “Hurry!” So I did, just as the lighted sign indicated our final approach and just as the turbulence started. It was a herky-jerky dash to the front, quick entry to the lav and no time to spare. I do not know what possessed the configurers of that plane to place the stability handgrip on the right side of the commode. But in order to stay upright as the place heaved to and fro, that’s what I needed to grab, leaving me to complete my errand with my left hand. I am right handed. I did my best, but what pilots tend to describe as “a few bumps” were approximately like the scenes of city-slicker John Travolta trying to ride a mechanical Texas bull in Urban Cowboy. And what an apt metaphor for my own misbegotten adventure as a country poseur.

Left. Right. Up. Down. The plane went every which way, and so did most of my previous coffee. Not to put too fine a point on it, I painted the lavatory. Painted it. Meantime, an announcement reiterated our final approach. Ding. Ding. “Return to your seat.” I didn’t even have time to wipe up around me. As I mentioned, I don’t have much shame, but I also don’t have a death wish. I opened the door to escape the Tomb of Urine. And there, three inches from my face, stood another passenger, as eager to get in as I was to get out.

In abject horror I mumbled, “So, so sorry.” Yet for all my humiliation, my thought bubble spoke differently: “Hello, again, Mr. President. Tag, you’re it.”