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I first noticed I was becoming famous sometime last year. It was time to renew my drivers license and I was standing in line at the Texas Dept. of Public Safety. The line wrapped around the inside of the building and out into the street. A half hour passed, then an hour. I was getting very frustrated. But then a woman wearing a TDPS badge came over and told me I was standing in the wrong line. She said I was standing in the line reserved for new drivers’ licenses. I must have made a pretty surly-looking face, because right away she got all defensive. “Hey, I’m sorry you’re in the wrong line,” she said. “It’s just that I saw the documents in your hand and they’re not the right documents. Not for this line, anyway.”
In retrospect, I wish I would have thanked her. Instead, I just glared and moved over to the next line. It was even longer than the first. Standing in that line provided me with lots of time to think about what had just happened. She’d seen the documents in my hand. There was something odd about that. Why had she been looking at my documents? Why had she been looking at my hand? (Guys, women always look at your hands) I didn’t think it was merely a lucky break. It was something more than that. That’s when it hit me. She recognized me. She was a fan. She must read my blogs. Hallelujah!
That’s how it started. For lots of people, it probably would have been enough. Setting up a blog is one thing, but getting an actual person to read it is quite another. Believe me, it’s no easy achievement. But why else had the woman singled me out to switch lines? As everyone knows, good looks can only get you only so far. And good looks don’t get you anywhere at the TDPS. That’s why I was pretty sure the woman’s attentions meant my blog had finally taken off.
Of course, one reader didn’t mean much. Not to me, anyway. I was shooting higher. Much higher. I was going for rock star status.
In retrospect, it seems like it was all so easy. As everyone knows by now, I achieved rock star status almost overnight. But it wasn’t all fun and games. It's easy to forget all the hard work that goes into achieving rock star status. Who remembers that Britney Spears was once a Mouseketeer? See what I mean? That’s how it is with me. I was once a nobody too. I think you’ll forgive me if I skip over that part of my life—all that posting and linking and watching my traffic numbers and arguing with big nobodies in comments that no one ever read—and get right to what it’s like for me today. I want to introduce you to Ric J, a once normal guy, now living with rock star status. I’m not one to boast, but it kicks ass to be me. Everyone knows I play in a pool league. You haven’t lived until you’ve shown up at the pool hall and crowds are waiting for you at the door and in the parking lot, chanting your name, waving banners, not caring a bit whether your hair is uncombed or whether you are wearing the same shirt from the night before. It’s cool, people, and it’s my life. Like I said, it kicks ass. Why, I can even be late. Just having me show up is enough. In fact, they expect it. That’s the kind of thing that rock star status gets you.
It still gives me a thrill the way lady pool players approach me with their blouses unbuttoned at least halfway and they’ll be standing there with a pen wanting me to sign my name on their bare skin. I’ve even signed a few derrieres, believe it or not. Even some guys ask to have an autograph. It’s the sort of thing rock star status will get you. It’s something money just can’t buy.
It’s not all good, of course. Not only do I have to spend a good amount of time partying every night, but I also have to get a post or two together every morning. If you don’t have a blog of your own, it might be hard for you to understand, but it’s a lot of work thinking of things to write about.
I know that not everyone loves me. Some people say I’m nothing but a one-hit wonder. Some people say I’m too old for a blog, that at fifty-two, I should have retired from blogs long ago. Some say I’m nothing but a looser with too much free time and a computer. I know that’s what they say, but I don’t care. It’s just sour grapes. Sour grapes from bloggers who haven’t achieved rock star status. They know who they are. They’re the ones with the crappy blogs no one reads. They’re the ones who are always complaining about people like me. Boo hoo hoo. We’re supposed to feel bad because we get all the links and all the traffic and the other blogs get nothing? Hey, it’s not our fault. Don’t blame us if we’re great. And don’t think it’s just an accident. It’s not. Money for nothing and chicks for free? Not hardly. If we have rock star status, we have it for a reason. It’s because we’re better than the rest, we work harder than the rest, and we don’t have to beg. Not ever.
Not very often, anyway. But now that we’re at the end of this post, I should point out that despite all my bravado, there are times I lie awake in the middle of the night and wonder when it all might end. It could happen, couldn’t it? Sure it’s unlikely, but who knows? It’s not like I’m begging or anything. I’m asking politely as one blogger with rock star status to four others. Believe me, if I didn’t have rock star status already, I wouldn’t even bother asking. Not that having another blogger mention you in a post is ever a bother! It’s not. Even bloggers with rock star status love the attention of links from other blogs. How do you think they got that way? How do you think they stay that way? So peeps—if you’re feeling generous, how about a link? If you want, I’ll let you share my groupies. I’ll even let you borrow my limousine. No one else even needs to know.
Ric
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