Dick Cavett-itis

That obsessive fanaticism was short lived after all.

 A week after seeing "The Cher Show" we're still humming her songs, but not as often.

The same thing happened last spring after we left the (Graceland) building.

  We were no longer breathing the air that Elvis breathed, making us ordinary people who appreciated his talent, rather than the super fans we had been for that entire weekend in Memphis.

We then got to thinking:  Were either of us ever die-hard fanatics of anyone? 

 Jim was always very into Elton John, but would he follow him to every city if he went on another tour?  

I'm thinking probably not.

That led to  an interesting conversation, where we'd name people we know and try to identify their celebrity crush, or we'd name a celebrity, and then see if we could name their biggest fan from all the people we know on Facebook or from real life.

This experiment was easier when I was younger...anyone who knew me in high school knew about the obsession I had with talk show host Dick Cavett. 

 My English teacher certainly knew as my grades dropped due to my need to use his name in every essay I submitted, or because my grammar was off due to all the sleep I was losing from staying up so late, decades before the invention of recording devices. 

Once, in the summer of 1972, I convinced two friends to board the train with me as I lied about my age and scored tickets to a taping for guests "eighteen and up" in New York City.

The taping was canceled because of the Democratic convention, which we didn't find out until we got there, but I did get to shake his hand and I screamed like a teenager did during this month sixty years ago, seeing the Beatles in this same Ed Sullivan theater.

"I'll never wash this hand again!" I shouted to my friends, and probably never did.

My ditzy Mom curiously said the same thing when she shook George Bush(the father's) hand during a visit to Ogunquit one summer. He and his wife Barbara were big fans of Barnacle Billy's in Perkin's Cove, which they frequented often. 

She hadn't even voted for him, but she made that promise..because she was.. who she was.

My celebrity crushes died down a little until the 1990's, when everything was about David Letterman.

(And yes, of COURSE I see the pattern here.  Witty intellectuals do if for me.  Muscular hunks do not)

I was watching TV at my mom's with my then four year old niece,Marissa, when a promotion came on for his evening show, and I told  he'd be my "hall pass" without necessarily telling her what that phrase meant...

I told her that David Letterman made me laugh and think and that I was probably a little in love with him, that he was the one who "did it" for me, and she looked me straight in the eye and responded, "for me, it's Barney."

I never hung posters of rock stars but I did send fan mail to  to heros like Charles Schulz and Angela Cartwright, saving their responses for years until they became victims of my long denied hoarding problem.

So now that you've read all of this I gotta know, what celebrity do you associate with me?

Or..what person, place, or thing..not necessarily a superstar, makes you think of my name as soon as that word is uttered out loud?

One word answers, please!

I'm curious to read the responses..and to see if I could fill in the blank while responding to your comment with who I think you'd give that hall pass to.

I think I used up all my hall passes on Ethan Hawke(but only from the "Before" trilogy when he was the hot and sexy Jesse Wallace,) or Jimmy Kimmel, but the latter used to host "The Man Show" so..nah.

My icons these days are snarky gay comics and lyricists, and my girl crushes are on plus sized bitches, which is kind of conceited since that would mean professing for love myself.

Which everyone should.

Not love me..love themselves!