WRITERS
Shay Robertson - Shay Craig Robertson is a housewife-hobbyist living in suburban Chicago with her husband, three children, and The Dog. If she were an X-Man, she would be called Behemoth and her power would be spewing emotive, inflated if lyrical verbal abuse at unsuspecting members of the Brotherhood of Mutants and Hoosiers. Her witty, self-depricating essays and romantic tripe, while unappreciated in her time, will doubtless win her a place in the Norton Anthology her grandchildren use in college. For now, her effusions can be enjoyed in Gooch!, Runners World, and letters to the editor of the Florafox, ex Chacago Tribune.
The Brush with Fame Story,
a Holiday Tradition
by Shay Robertson
Everyone has these stories. We all know they are out there and if things get really bad at a cocktail party, you can always turn to the human saddle burr next to you and say, "So, whatÕs your best Brush with Fame story." It's a social crutch. Only the most socially slow-witted cannot name a single celebrity with whom they share eight degrees of separation. Only the most conversationally disabled cannot come up with some self aggrandizing tall tale involving a person whose name is a crossword answer. It is called the Mingle Mangle when you canÕt come up with a single Brush With Fame even when called upon to do so by your profoundly charismatic hostess. If you do it at the Holidays. it is called the Jingle Jangle Mingle Mangle. Here's my holiday party advice - don't take less than Moet White Star and don't forget your best Brush with Fame Story.
Because a Brush With Fame story is a gift you give yourself. Seemingly the most insidious and heinous of all social tortures, the Brush with Fame story is a holiday tradition in its most real sense, a contemporary Christmas Pudding set alight for all and sundry to see, doubt and make fun of later.
Of course, as with any holiday tradition, there must be rules. Precisely because everyone under the sun has met at least one person whose name is (pause) carefully enunciated (pause), we must all begin to show a little restraint. We must all comply with the following arbitrary and subjective rules created and enforced by me.
What is a Brush with Fame (hereinafter BWF)?
1. It is not a brush with fame if the person is an actor. Meeting an actor is not like meeting a real person; it's like meeting a silver-less mirror. In the immortal words of Alfred Hitchcock (a meeting with whom would be a BWF) actors are cattle. If you met old Bessie on the El you wouldnÕt say you had a brush with fame. (The obvious exception being if you met Old Mrs. Leary's Cow). (Oh, and the exceptions to the actor rule would be Henry Fonda, Audrey Hepburn or Sir John Redgrave - if you meet these people you get more than BWF points.) Besides we are all actors, especially if we are working the holiday evening party circuit and who's to say we don't all deserve an Oscar for smiling at this particular Eggnog.
2. A brush with fame can only apply to politicians if they are ethical. This rule also applies to Santa.
3. A brush with fame therefore applies only to Rock and Roll stars. I would love to say it can be applied to classical music or the great men and women of jazz' but let me tell you as a Hoosier that despite Ken Burns' best efforts, most people here in the heartland don't know Art Tatum from Sir George Solti.
So we've established that the story has to be about a Rock and Roller. Now, what about the story. Well, honey, the truth of the matter is the story is about you, the Rock and Roller is a silhouette in the window, a blip, a sunspot, a glitch in the system. The Rock and Roller gets second billing. Now, as an example of a perfect one and since this whole piece is an excuse to do so, IÕll tell you my BWF story.
I was invited by a tall person to attend an AIDS benefit at Barneys New York. I bought a jacket from a nice Ecuadorian man and wore my Gap jeans. At the door, we were given little black pins with little colored triangles on them. The color of your triangle indicated the level of your commitment (contribution). I wore a red triangle, - I had gotten in on association. Much like AIDS itself.
But then I went to the bathroom. There on the counter in the otherwise empty potty was a little black pin with a pink triangle on it. Pink triangle means free drinks.
So I spent the rest of the party in a happy pink triangle place. I drank champagne. I noshed. I looked at $380 beaded purses. And as we were assembling around the balcony for the silent auction, I looked at the very pretty woman standing over there.
Exquisite really.
And she looked at me.
And I looked away.
And then, I could not help myself, I looked back.
And she smiled.
And I looked away. It was one of those things where you have been caught looking at someone and now you canÕt help yourself you keep looking at them, just to see if they have noticed that you have stopped looking at them.
And then I looked back and she was gone.
That was because she was right next to me. Standing next to me, holding out an elegant hand dripping with gorgeous Latinate jewelry. She said her name and then said, "Do I know you?"
And here I was forced to say, "No, you donÕt. ItÕs just one of those things where I was looking at you and then you looked and I looked away and then it seemed like I was looking..." I was rambling but at least she was smiling.
The silent auction was about to begin. She glanced up over my shoulder and smiled. "Here's my husband." she said in her cultured voice. Her husband stepped around in front of me. He was David Byrne.
I should pause here to tell you that for four long years of my life the only thing hanging on the tortured walls of my pubescent bedroom was a life sized black and white poster of David Byrne. He was a poet, a visionary, a God. He and Space Brownies constituted just about everything valuable that came out of the early eighties for me. And here he was standing in front of me.
He held out a bony hand. He smiled a crooked smile. I am confronted with the actual incarnation of the bard of my adolescence, and what do I say?
"Oh, my husband's name is David, too." ThatÕs what I said. And I can't take it back.
The next day, when I related all this to my own David, via phone at work, he was fixated on the fact that some very tall New York hockey players had entered the scene escorting cool, tall, vulnerable and luscious women, one of whom was the chic who got me in there.
"Hockey players?" he said.
"Yeah," I said, "I had not idea they were so tall."
"Were they called the Knicks?" he said? You could hear the guy from Patterson in the background of his speakerphone trying to defenestrate himself.
That is the essence of a good BWF story. The Famous Person just makes a cameo, itÕs all about you. That is prolly why the tragically shy can't tell them. God, for all we know, sweet shy Mari the librarian has met Umberto Echo or Scott Simon. But we'll never know because she will never tell the story. And you know what? ThatÕs okay with me. I believe if you can't tell a story right, shut up and get a canapĀ.
Because a good BWF story is not about the Famous Person, it is about you.
My First Grade Brownie Troop at Carmel Elementary have had a brush with fame. A few weeks ago they were all het up about a big all-school party where people from all around were going to come and give money to the already bursting coffers of the PTO. One of the rumored guests was going to be Mrs. Hunter. That's right Mrs. Hunter, the sweet, mild mannered, transferred-to-another-school-out-of-some-financial-stupidity kindergarten teacher who guided them all through "make an S but please donÕt wait, wind back up and make and eight" and other priceless pearls. Their kindergarten teacher would be coming to Tiger Fest. There was a stunned silence in the room. The girls looked startled their eyes glazed over. After a moment, whispering began: "Do you really think she'll come?", "I really miss her", "Do you think she'll remember me?" One little girl actually said, "Every time I think of Mrs. Hunter, I feel all sorry inside because she is gone."
For these little girls, what makes Mrs. Hunter famous is what she gave them that became part of them. For them to tell their stories about running into her at the market or the park is to tell a little about how important she is and how well she did her job. The same is true of David Byrne. He wrote People like Us for me and it makes me feel good to hear it.
So go ahead and tell your most indulgent BWF story. Tell it long, exaggerate and digress, take your time and bore your audience. It is a tribute to the person you brushed and their gift to you. And Mari the timid librarian will be glad the spotlight is off her at last.
Merry Christmas
back to top
