On Fame

This weekend in Chicago I had an opportunity to eat dinner with some very famous people. It was nothing planned on my end; more of an invitation extended, and accepted, and the next thing you know it's seven hours later and the combined Twitter follower count at the table is well into 8-figures.

Meeting famous people is a funny thing that tends to be both overwhelming and underwhelming at the same time. For one thing, people who look extremely handsome on TV are, in fact, extremely handsome in real life. And they do often possess that swagger, or gravitas, that comes from perpetually inhabiting the center of attention. And despite the aphorism that "famous people are always way shorter than you expect," some, in fact, turn out to be gigantic.

On the other hand, there's the underwhelming/humanizing aspect of the encounter. Even famous female pop stars eventually have to take a crap after a few days. Not to mention a few other funny things I just saw famous people do: hold awkward eye contact, lose their phone in a public bathroom, walk into a chair, trip while getting into a car, tell a lame joke, hold their cigarette like a cornball, and (most intriguingly) eye other famous people with bewilderment.

At the end of the day, the stars really are just like us. The only difference? Risk-taking, luck, and focus.

"Life is a warfare and a stranger's sojourn, and after fame is oblivion." - Marcus Aurelius