Meeting someone famous

This last Friday I had the opportunity to meet some men who are relatively famous, depending on what circles you are in.  I follow both men on Twitter and have read books both published.  These are the first two people I have ever met that one would consider as famous.   If for whatever reason you aren’t familiar with them, check out the links

Twitter – @jonacuff /http://www.jonacuff.com/stuffchristianslike/

Twitter – @daveramsey/http://www.daveramsey.com

My family was not one to do much entertaining when I was growing up.  We had family over but really no one else came over.  So it was rare to have people in our house.  When I was in the 5^th grade I started going through a Catechism class at the Lutheran Church we attended.  For whatever reason my mom agreed to let the class participants and their parents come to our house.  You would have thought someone famous was coming to our house, we cleaned like we had never cleaned before, we scrubbed walls, bleached anything possible and had our humble little single wide trailer looking as good as it could get. 

As a young kid growing up in Montana we didn’t see a lot of famous people coming through our state.  In fact the university we lived closest to wasn’t set up to handle large concerts.  The first concert I ever went to was Amy Grant and Kenny Loggins.  I never got to meet either one.  The only real band I ever wanted to see was Def Leppard and I never got to do that. Later in college I took my mom to see Reba McEntire, Brooks &Dunn and Clint Black (in case you don’t know who they are – it country music artists).  I asked my mom while we were at the concert what she would do if we could meet them and she said she would be shocked and not know what to do or say.  That always struck me as odd.

We tend to glamorize and make folks into celebrities.  Hollywood does a great job of thrusting folks into stardom, building them up and making them larger than life.  People idolize them and put them up on a pedestal.  I will admit I have been star struck a few times in my life.  However in thinking about it, when we strip all the glamour and Hollywood from a person, they are still a person, they still have struggles just like you and me and there is no guarantees for their life.  God may be using them in different ways than me, but it’s still a person and not God. 

I enjoy all types of people from all walks of life.  I love just talking to others and getting to know them.  Despite being famous or semi-famous I a still going to treat you the same.  I would welcome you into my home as if you were family, feed you, see if there were any other needs I could help with and enjoy the time talking with you.  My wife and I do a lot of entertaining and have people over all the time.  When I am sitting there talking with you, I don’t care if you’re the President of the United States or my neighbor.   You mean the same to me no matter what.

I really enjoyed meeting both Dave Ramsey and Jonathan Acuff.  I had a great time hanging out and listening to them and engaging in conversation with them.  When I found out they were both coming to Portland and I could meet them I took advantage of the opportunity.  I actually have a friend who lives in Nashville and goes to the same church as Jonathan and his family and is in a small group with him.  He didn’t tell me this until I old him I was going to get to meet him and how much I would really enjoy talking to him and he was right. 

Living in Portland we have a number of  folks considered to be famous.  One of those I would most enjoy meeting, sharing food and spending an evening talking to is Donald Miller.  I have yet to run into him, but hope some day I will. Given the size of Portland I shouldn’t be shocked at the amount of folks on Twitter and those who are blogging.  I have tweeted with  a few of them.  To my surprise I got to meet someone I follow and exchanging Tweets with, Matt was there with his family and it was a great honor for me to talk with him.

What about you, what would you do if you met someone famous?  Who would you most like meet?

Social Media Delusions

Remember when AOL was king?  I remember when my wife and I first got Internet.  AOL was really the only thing available and it was dial-up.  Remember the sounds the computer would make when it was dialing?  Remember it telling, “You’ve got mail” as a flag on the mailbox was lifted to show someone had sent you e-mail.  That was back in the day, for some of us a very long time ago, for me it was right before I had kids, so thinking back now it makes me feel OLD.

I remember spending hours just trying to figure out how the “internet” worked.  I checked out chat rooms, conversed with other clear across the country, read and responded to message boards and yes I looked and viewed things I had never seen or imagined in my life.  I spent endless hours just sitting and staring at a computer screen.

I have one friend that I met through a message board and we have continue to stay in contact to this day.  We’ve never met face to face and hope that in the next few years it will work out so we can, but we text, e-mail, Face book, and talk on the phone.  He’s a great friend and over the years we’ve shared our struggles as men, celebrated in the births of our children and spent countless times just talking about work, life and the challenges we face as fathers.  It’s been a great friendship and one I value.  It will be a sweet sweet day when we actually meet face to face.

I’ve tried to stay on top of things so I’ve joined MySpace, Facebook and Twitter as well as a lot of other sites trying to stay plugged in and connected.  I can say that for years I had wished there was a way I could stay connected with everyone I knew.  Relationships have always mattered to me and so with people I had gone to school with, family, co-workers and others I was glad when Facebook came along.  It’s allowed me to keep in contact with them.  I deleted MySpace many years ago as I realized it was really not for the 30 and over crowd.

In 2009 I joined Twitter and started in the Dad blogging community.  I started making connections with so many cool Dads as well as others.  I would read blogs and feel an instant connection with the writers.  I too had either had a similar experience or could relate.  It didn’t take me long to figure out Twitter and so I began having daily interactions with Dads who followed my blog and had connected with me on Twitter.  I talked to people all over the world and it truly was and has been an amazing experience.  It’s been said that Twitter is where you pick all the cool people you wish you’d gone to school with or grew up with and I would say I 100% support that.  I have been incredibly blessed to make a ton of connections.

As someone who likes connecting with lots of different people and having a range of friends all over the place, this has been a great invention for me personally.  Although I don’t know if you really call people you connect with on the Internet but never see in person friends.  Not sure how to define that.  It’s what I call them though.

I became delusional after some time in doing it.  I began to believe that somehow I was really going to meet these cool Dads and other folks in person.  I had dreams where I traveled around meeting others who loggers.  I was hopeful some company was going to pay me to travel around doing a documentary on bloggers and I meet, interview and get photos of all the cool people I had met on Twitter.  I kept holding onto this dream thinking it was really going to happen.  The more I connected with others the more I really believed I would somehow meet them in real life.

This is the reality in which we live today.  The Internet and social media make it very easy for us to meet and connect with so many people we may never meet with in our regular lives.  I enjoy this, but the downside for me is that when I meet someone, have continual conversations exchanged over a period of time I feel a connection to this person and I wish it could be more.  It’s at this point I do a reality check and tell myself in all likelihood it will never happen and you can either enjoy what you have or stop doing it.

I have had the pleasure of talking on the phone to other bloggers as well as Skyping with them and it’s been a great way to connect deeper.  It’s allowed me to have some really deep and intense conversations with people I already respect and admire and to hear more about their story and what they’ve been through in their life.  That for me is something I will never tire of.  In hearing someone’s story I find I can always connect with the person. I will say that I am thankful for being able to actually have met 1 other Tweep and blogger that lives here in Portland and that is @portlanddad, James.  I have enjoyed the friendship we have developed. He’s an awesome all around guy, great Dad and tells some amazing stories of what it is like for him as a SAHD (stay at home dad) raising his boys.  If nothing else this has helped to at least fulfill one of my dreams and I wouldn’t change it for a moment.

I can’t imagine what social media and the Internet will look like in another 10 – 20 years.  Most of kids will all be adults by then and on with their own lives.  The one thing I am thankful for; unlike the past is that I am sure I will be able to instantly connect with them wherever they are at and with whatever they are doing.  I won’t have to miss much of their lives this way.  I don’t think AOL will ever be what it once was and I still secretly hold out that one day I will be able to make connections with so many others, but I continue to remind myself to enjoy the connections as they are.

Can you relate? How had social media impacted or changed your way of life and how you look and define friendships?