Anomalies: Nothing Is As It Seems To Be

 

anomaly - noun - something that deviates from what is expected.

Life is filled with errant anomalies. Just when you think you have it all down, you don't. The norm is no longer normal. Nothing is what it seems to be, especially not here in La La Land.  For whatever reason, Americans are in love with celebrity. The celebrated are placed on pedestals and worshipped like Greek gods; however, they aren't. Most of them run opposed to expectations. The more biographies and autobiographies of celebrated people I read, the more convinced I am that somehow these very ordinary folks have had to pay a high price for fame. And the more monetarily fortunate people I come into contact with in Hollywood, the more I realize just how true the adage is. 

Case in point, a good friend of mine, a former actor, is a storyteller, an award-winning one. Last week, I attended her one-woman show at what looked like a former gift shop in Laurel Canyon, a former bastion of musical creativity. A fan of truth, V. opened the flood gates and inundated us with honesty. A few short decades ago, her former husband had been a top Hollywood sitcom writer. He had one hit television show after the next. Soon his coffers were overflowing with extra capital, which he invested in race horses, trotters to be exact, not like the thoroughbreds you saw running through the mud for the roses today at Churchill Downs. The man had fifty, all housed at various stables throughout the country. But they weren't winners. Before he knew it, he was in debt almost a million dollars. He couldn't sell the horses, nor did he want to; so without a second thought for his young daughter who idolized him and his wife who pretty much despised him (for his selfishness mainly), he put an end to his Shakespearean tragedy in Greek fashion by taking his own life. All of the aforementioned V. exposed to us in sixty minutes of articulate, oral, literary prose, memorized painstakingly. As it has been said before, there wasn't a dry eye in the house. 

Another case in point occurred just last night as I was volunteering at the BeachLife music festival in Redondo Beach when I offered to assist a forlorn, albeit very well-dressed, woman in her quest for the VIP restrooms. After announcing for no real reason her unfortunate plight (she had lost her mansion in Pacific Palisades to the L.A. fires), she caught my attention and my sympathy so that I became her personal escort and unlicensed therapist for the next ten minutes. Apparently, she had been married and divorced from a very well-known, high-powered Hollywood producer who assuaged her resentment at his departure by buying her and her children the dream house lost in the conflagration. At present, she and her brood are renting an economical ranch-style home in Santa Monica, something she described as being quite the nightmare. (Most would not think so. I'm guessing.) Before leaving her to return to latrine duty, I hugged her, falling into the velvet softness of her black mink jacket that masked the fragility of her soul. She didn't seem to want to let go, poor thing. (In hindsight, I'm thinking she might have been a tad sauced. No matter.) As I pushed through the crowds toward the food court, it occurred to me that money and fame can't buy happiness. In fact, they often buy misery instead. 

The gossip tabloids pen what they want you to hear, and most of the time, the writing reveals the gloss only. Which is why readers formulate opinions that are inaccurate. No life is perfect; no individual is perfect. Celebrities feet touch the ground like those of ordinary people. Because of the complexity of their lives, perhaps they experience more pain. The takeaway here is that happiness is something that emanates from within and cannot be bought. The next time you feel envy for a celebrity whom you don't know at all, remember the theme of this blog: Nothing is as it seems to be. 

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