A long time ago, I was asked to speak at an important event at Grumman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood.
(By the way, now it’s called The TLC Chinese Theater, but when I spoke at this venue, it was still called Grumman’s.)
Anyway. It was a pretty big honor in the early days of my career to speak at this event — along with a handful of minor celebrities and known entities in the entertainment business. The speaking gig was for a non-profit organization and it was hosted by a film production company I had been working with on a big project, and so I was asked to add my voice to this collection of other voices to help inspire the youngsters in attendance to strive and persevere in their lives despite the hindrances in their way.
I remember I got to the event a bit early that day — because that’s kind of how I roll — and I checked in with this woman I’d never met, but who I was informed would be my point of contact when I arrived. The woman was quite frazzled as she was setting up for the event all on her own. I remember she was putting some linens on a few long tables, and so I asked her if I could help. She accepted my help, and then she started barking a few more orders at me to “move that” or “pick up this.” She was quite snappy and curt, but I could tell she was under a time crunch, so I gave her some grace and did as I was told.
About an hour later, things were getting really busy as the more famous speakers started to arrive, and the lady seemed to turn on a fake kind of charm when she greeted these people. When the most known celebrity arrived, I was standing near the bossy lady, and I remember her turning to me and telling me to get this lady a bottle of water. So I did.
Not long after that, the main organizer of the event arrived, and when he saw me, he rushed over to me and gave me a big hug. Then he turned to the snappy lady and said, “Janice, have you met Sonja? She’s going to be our anchor speaker today — she’s the author of the book I gave you, Hurricane Season.” Immediately, a mortified look came over Janice’s face.
Suddenly, I wasn’t just some random lady to boss around.
Instead, I was a featured speaker at the event and the author of a book she’d received from her boss! Janice reached for my hand and apologized for not recognizing me, and then she went on to tell me how much she loved my book, and how excited she was to hear me speak. She gushed and gushed and I could see how deeply embarrassed she was. So I reacted with kindness and gratitude for the compliments she gave me about my novel. But later, when I was sitting in the audience waiting for my turn to speak, I had a chance to organize some of my thoughts a bit better.
When I first arrived, I was a Nobody to Janice. But in the span of twenty seconds or so, I was miraculously transformed into a Somebody who now “deserved” the royal treatment?
From my point of view, I never changed from a Nobody into a Somebody that day. I was always the same. And, I want to believe even if I had been a real Somebody, I would’ve offered to help Janice in any way I could when I first arrived. I hope I never get to the point in my life where helping others is too much of a bother, but you never know how real fame can change you. And, the fact is, Janice may not have accepted my help if she’d known who I was. She may have rebuffed me because she might have assumed I was too fancy to help!
But it seems for Janice, having that new detail attached to my presence changed so much about me in her eyes, and that still baffles me. I suppose I do get it. This kind of Nobody / Somebody routine is probably the most pronounced in places like Hollywood, but I think it can probably happen everywhere you go. (Because if I’m looking at myself with a lot of honesty, I’m sure I’ve probably been dismissive of others when I don’t know who they are sometimes, too.)
I see that there’s this natural tendency to put a higher value on certain people because they are famous, or rich, or “more important” than someone else in the grand scheme of things. Yet when you get right down to it, no one is really all that different from someone else if you don’t know who they are, or what they’ve done. The layers of fame, fortune, or prestige are placed upon us as humans, not in us… But once that kind of information is added to the mix, a person you’d pass by on the street without ever thinking a thing can become the person someone else recognizes as a contributor who might be incredibly “worth” knowing!
So strange…
But for me when it comes to Janice, she was always the same. She was always a stressed-out lady with a single assignment to make things “perfect” for the event, and she just needed a helping hand. And once she learned the identity of the person with the helping hands, she still seemed like the same lady to me — only now, her cheeks were quite flushed, and her body was probably flowing with the adrenaline that pumps through your system when you realize you just did something you’re not proud of.
Out of all of the things that happened that day at Grumman’s, the exchange I had with Janice has stayed with me the longest. I think the reason for that is because even then, I wasn’t really a Somebody yet, but it was one of my first experiences with that potential. But not long after I spoke at that event, my life fully went down the tubes, and I went from having a fancy life with a lot of potential to living out of my car and struggling for years and years to find my way back to my former status as a known author.
Being known changes things for people. I totally understand that fact. But what if one day I wake up, and I have hundreds of thousands of followers on my blog? Will that reality change me? Probably a little. But I hope not a lot! I hope I will always have the courage to just be myself no matter how others need to see me. I hope the lessons I’ve learned in my life as I’ve transitioned into a more real and honest understanding of who I am, and how the world really operates, will help me stay grounded and centered no matter what happens to me — even if things stay exactly the same!
I remember at the end of that event, all of the speakers were lined up near the exit of the theater to shake hands with the attendees and to send them off with lots of love and encouragement. Janice was the one who was organizing the line up of the speakers, and she seemed to still be in a frazzled state. But I clearly remember her going out of her way to make sure I got a good spot, and part of me enjoyed the extra care of the celebrity treatment.
But a bigger part of me felt conflicted by it.
Who knows if I’ll ever have to worry about fame changing me or creating something that only complicates my understanding of the world around me. But I do know that even if I never gain any attention for the stories I write or the content I produce, I know I’ll always be a part of this cultural game of hopscotch that bounces between the Nobodies and the Somebodies. I guess I know this because in the very broadest of terms, I will always be one of the other.
