The other night I was pleasantly surprised to find David Gray singing his beautiful songs at the Columbus Circle complex for a promotion of his new CD, "Draw The Line," in conjunction with Borders. After Mr. Gray sang, all love songs mainly straight to me, he began signing copies of his new CD. Knowing how beautiful he is and being a super fan, I immediately purchased the CD and got in line!
While waiting and wondering if I was going to get nervous, I was brought back to the one other time I waited in line to get the autograph of a celebrity. It was back in 1981, maybe 1983, at the height of the Dukes of Hazzard craze. My father brought my brother Davey and I to a Dukes of Hazzard convention where Tom Wopat, Mr. Luke Duke Himself, was meeting fans and signing autographs. Davey was a HUGE fan of the show, just like every other 12-year-old boy, and I was a huge fan of Bo Duke. I used to kiss the television screen as soon as his mug appeared on those memorable Friday nights. I even remember wanting him and Daisy to kiss and I didn't care one bit that they were related! I just thought that they were both so beautiful that they should totally be kissing one another!
At the event, my father dispensed Davey and I in line to meet Mr. Wopat while he perused the hot rods and chargers I presume. Wopat was situated on a riser above the crowd, thus giving everyone a clear view of him. As we waited, we watched and I began to notice a pattern. For every woman that is meeting Wopat, he is hugging each of them and often times kissing them on the cheeks! I was starting to freak out, mind you I was a 9-year-old girl, but I thought this was going to happen to me and I couldn't imagine kissing and hugging a man at that time, let alone a man that wasn't Bo Duke!
As we got closer, my anxiety got higher, I unfortunately didn't share this fear with Davey who likely could have pointed out to me that I was just a kid and Luke wasn't going to kiss me. Finally, just before we meet Wopat, I let the beans spill to Davey, and he did the brotherly thing, he played into my anxiety. He told me how Wopat was going to be kissing me and making out with me because I am a girl after all, and then he had to make matters even worse by saying how disappointed I must have been that Bo wasn't there and that I was settling for Luke instead. He was indeed right, but I didn't want to discuss this with my brother.
The time finally came to meet Luke and I was scared out of my mind. "What if he kisses me!?" I kept thinking. We stepped up on the riser, above the crowd who is watching, in what I believe is in anticipation if Luke kisses me or not—yeah I was a little ego-centric. While I am dying, Davey is buoyant and excited as gets his Tom-Wopat-as-Luke-Duke headshot signed. He's stupidly babbling away as I am internalizing my fate when I suddenly hear him say "This is my sister, she's in love with Bo."
OH MY GOD! The fact that I didn't literally have the first panic attack of my life right then and there is beyond me. Mr. Wopat of course laughed as I wanted to die. I barely said a word as I meekly handed him my Tom-Wopat-as-Luke-Duke headshot and waited. He signed the pic as he tried to make small talk with me and then I saw him begin to stand up. "OH MY GOSH! Here is comes!" I thought. And then the arm, the huge manly Luke Duke arm nestled in blue plaid comes barreling toward my weeness and I freak. I say, as politely as possible, "No. No. I don't want that!" And my arms and head flail 'no' and I run away. It wasn't until I looked out into the crowd did I really realize I had an audience. I saw people imitating my classic 'No Luke Duke you won't be kissing me' move and I wanted to die all over again. Of course the dying didn't happen and of course Wopat didn't want to kiss me. He was just going in for a friendly arm over the shoulder for a quick photog shot with the professional photographer on sight. While I sort of realized this at the time, I, of course, thought making out would happen after, so I declined to be photographed.
And then it hit me, while women were being hugged and kissed I never saw any of them getting their photograph taken and now I was really upset. Upset because I realized I was the cute little girl that was special enough to be the subject of a Tom Wopat publicity shot and I ruined it! Sadly I let that dream go and later, to feel better, purchased a patch featuring a white Maltese for my mom's fictional trucker hat; my mom really liked Maltese dogs at the time and wanted one, the dog, not the trucker patch.
Foxy and David Gray
As for David Gray, I wasn't really that nervous about meeting the most beautiful English, Wales-raised love song writer of our time; I was more hoping that he would totally make out with me, hug me, and demand for publicity photog shots to be taken so that when it came time for our wedding we would have a photographic evidence of the day we met. According to The Secret, the book I picked up in line and read the gist of in all of 20 minutes, my marriage with David Gray was suppose happened as my thoughts were concentrating hard to make it happen; suffice it to say The Secret is crap. Super hot David Gray barely noticed me, however he did call me FOXY! But this was probably because that is how I asked him to sign my CD.
The time finally came to meet Luke and I was scared out of my mind. "What if he kisses me!?" I kept thinking. We stepped up on the riser, above the crowd who is watching, in what I believe is in anticipation if Luke kisses me or not—yeah I was a little ego-centric. While I am dying, Davey is buoyant and excited as gets his Tom-Wopat-as-Luke-Duke headshot signed. He's stupidly babbling away as I am internalizing my fate when I suddenly hear him say "This is my sister, she's in love with Bo."
OH MY GOD! The fact that I didn't literally have the first panic attack of my life right then and there is beyond me. Mr. Wopat of course laughed as I wanted to die. I barely said a word as I meekly handed him my Tom-Wopat-as-Luke-Duke headshot and waited. He signed the pic as he tried to make small talk with me and then I saw him begin to stand up. "OH MY GOSH! Here is comes!" I thought. And then the arm, the huge manly Luke Duke arm nestled in blue plaid comes barreling toward my weeness and I freak. I say, as politely as possible, "No. No. I don't want that!" And my arms and head flail 'no' and I run away. It wasn't until I looked out into the crowd did I really realize I had an audience. I saw people imitating my classic 'No Luke Duke you won't be kissing me' move and I wanted to die all over again. Of course the dying didn't happen and of course Wopat didn't want to kiss me. He was just going in for a friendly arm over the shoulder for a quick photog shot with the professional photographer on sight. While I sort of realized this at the time, I, of course, thought making out would happen after, so I declined to be photographed.
And then it hit me, while women were being hugged and kissed I never saw any of them getting their photograph taken and now I was really upset. Upset because I realized I was the cute little girl that was special enough to be the subject of a Tom Wopat publicity shot and I ruined it! Sadly I let that dream go and later, to feel better, purchased a patch featuring a white Maltese for my mom's fictional trucker hat; my mom really liked Maltese dogs at the time and wanted one, the dog, not the trucker patch.
Foxy and David Gray
1 comment:
Where is the "like" button?
Great story. Did I tell you I used to jam with David Soul's son up in Duluth? The picture with you and David Grey looks like someone caught you guys catching up over a cup of coffee (in a cafeteria somewhere)
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