My First Celebrity

When a Midwestern transplant relocates to an entertainment-based city such as Los Angeles or New York (and maybe even Las Vegas), they can't help but ask people a very annoying question:





"Who was your first celebrity?"





Two weeks into my stay in Brooklyn, I got my first official visit from my high school friend Eva, who was visiting a college friend of hers that was finishing up an internship at the Today show. She was a very lovely girl and answered my question without judgment. Her answer:








Vanna White, who she saw in Central Park in one of her first weeks in the city (apparently Vanna was shooting an ad for Wheel of Fortune, which is sadly one of my favorite shows). "Great," I thought to myself. "I'll never have a first celebrity sighting like Vanna White."





Last week, I was in Manhattan coming home from the cybercafe, since Dell was ruining my life. I used a cafe on 49th Street, right off of Times Square and next to the theater that does Spring Awakening. I was in a pissy mood because of extenuating circumstances in my life, and I have theorized that Times Square, where everything is grandiose, magnifies your mood no matter what it is. If you are in a positive mood, then Times Square makes you realize that you're in this great city where there is so much culture and possibility. If you are in a negative mood, Times Square makes you wonder why people have to walk so god damn slow, and why can't they have "tourist hours" so you don't have to be behind people that pace like snails, and NO I DON'T WANT TO GO ON A BUS TOUR, and NO I DON'T WANT TO GO TO A LIVE COMEDY SHOW.





I am short, so I often look up and make eye contact with taller strangers. I don't do it to scare them, it just happens that way. Lo and behold, I am in Times Square at 9;30 PM on a Saturday, and out of the corner of my eye I make contact with his steely blue eyes and his protruding upper lip, and it's a very quick look, a look that may have said "Please don't recognize me", or "Christ you're a shrimp" or "Why am I in Times Square" or "You're really too old to enjoy my movies the way you do", but whatever the look was, it was a LOOK, and my first New York Celebrity was





who, interestingly enough, before moving to New York ever crossed I mind, I dreamed about him and New York -- no, no, it wasn't that kind of dream, I was shooting a movie in New York and he had a cameo or something (I never have naughty dreams about celebrities, but often strangely familiar ones, such as the time my brother, Brad Pitt and myself dined at TGI Friday's).

And there is my story.