Celebrity Sighting

Let me tell you a story about my friend, we’ll call him “Mr. Celebrity-Man”.

No, I’m not talking about Max Maven. If I talk about Max, as you all know I have, you can search the archives if you want to bother, anyhow, if I talk about Max, then I say that’s who I mean.

This isn’t about Max.

This is about “Mr. Celebrity-Man”, who isn’t going to get identified beyond that to spare you having to say “Huh, yeah, I think I heard of that show or movie but I didn’t see it” which would be half true and I like you all too much to make you lie to be polite…

… because this is really about being polite.

You see, “Mr. Celebrity-Man” was just in town. He was busy the whole time, performing and filming and such. This is a good and happy thing. My friends should all be busy like that, knock on wood.

But as Melva says, “It’s not what you do. It’s how you do it.”

See, “Mr. Celebrity-Man” is enough of a celebrity that he got tagged on Facebook the day he arrived.

(I didn’t see it, but I was told soon after it appeared.)

So we all found out he was here, but he didn’t contact anybody. Eventually I did text him, mostly as a good-natured gotcha, and we had a lovely meal at BeaBea’s right before he left, but the question is, as Melva asked me last night,

“Well, how would you have handled it?”

Auntie is not a celebrity of any kind, but I do recognize the unavoidability and ubiquity of the Internet. I’m also really big on the principle “What you can’t fix, feature.”

Ergo, I would have posted on Facebook something like:

“Dear friends, I’m in L.A. and I wish I could see you all but I’m afraid that work will take up my time this trip. If you can, please come by one of my performances, and if you can’t, I look forward to seeing you during a future visit.”

The take-away from all this, an un-asked Ask Auntie if you will, that may come in handy someday, is that if you state the truth with courtesy, sincerity and, most of all, respect, then you can get out of a lot of stuff – or at least postpone it.

Well, that’s a message which “Mr. Celebrity-Man” may or may not ever see depending on if he still reads this blog. I’ll let you know.