As a kid, I thought life would become easier as we aged. We would gain more knowledge and common sense, and make more associations that would aid us in our twilight years. I was wrong.
Each day I find another new person gracing the cover of some magazine, or as a guest on a talk show, with whom I am totally unfamiliar. Pictures of the prettiest people on Earth surround me at the grocery checkout, each of them wearing a beaming grin and clad in high-end clothing with nary a blemish to be found.
I’m not a fool. I realize that these photos are air-brushed into non-recognizable portraits of the original subjects but, it is time to explain who these folks are and how they secretly became famous.
Accompanying stories ramble on about them growing up on a farm in Arizona with 19 siblings. Dad left the family for a Chinese hooker and the family relied on good intentions from the offshoot religious cults they joined. Their big breaks came when they performed, shoeless, in a high school play and were spotted by Stephen Spielberg who happened to be visiting an ailing relative in town.
Still, I never saw these people even selling car insurance on TV, much less in a feature film that was nominated for an Oscar or Emmy Award. Lately, it is because they star in a vampire show either on TV or in the movies something about which I am not the least bit interested.
My youth was spent working and listening to music. I not only knew the songs and their recording artists but, I also knew the disc jockeys who spun those wax platters, much to my delight. Today, I don’t have a clue when I see a person as a guest on some after-the-late-news show. These folks are roundly applauded as much as The Pope and I usually feel stupid because I don’t recognize them.
But, I also wonder what happened to all those ‘stars’ that came and went in a flash a short time ago. Names of Star Search winners come to mind when mentioning once famous has-beens.
Let’s keep those celebrities fresh with new daily details and overwhelming information about their scandals so that I will know who to watch and idolize in the future. By the way, that reminds me that Kim Kardashian never returned that waffle iron wedding gift after her 72-day marriage.
