CUL-DE-SAC

The memory is a big storehouse whose dusty odds and ends occasionally turn up by chance or strange coincidence. Why else would I have thought about Kevin Keegan last week?

I was hosting a live radio program when I interviewed a reporter named Keegan Kyle. It’s a strange name, which seems to have the first and last names turned around. So it was no surprise, as I was back-announcing his name after the interview, that I muffed it. I called him Kevin Keegan.

Kevin Keegan in his prime.

But who is Kevin Keegan and why did I give the name to Keegan Kyle? The answer soon came to me. Kevin Keegan was a British soccer star who played for Hamburg, Germany’s pro team in 1978 when I lived there as a high-school exchange student.

Kevin Keegan has not come to my mind for — literally — decades. But while groping for a reporter’s odd name he emerged from my subconscious and leapt effortlessly from my lips.

Kevin Keegan played for Hamburger Sport Verein (HSV) in the late seventies after being a star for Liverpool earlier in the decade. When he played for Hamburg he had a big fluffy perm (it WAS the 70s) and many Hamburg teenage girls fell in love with him.

Another strange coincidence comes from this story. A colleague who also works at KPBS in San Diego heard my interview flub on the air, and it triggered a series of memories for her as well. She grew up in England and says Keegan visited her school when she was a kid.

Afterward, she got her picture taken with him. He put his arm around her for the photo and she thought it was creepy. She claims she still have the photo somewhere.

This entry was posted on November 21, 2011 at 12:57 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.