Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

Last weekend, a swarm of security guards and people with cameras walked by us at the park. Naturally, we were curious and followed the crowd. I guess I shouldn’t say we, since Toby rolled his eyes at us, but my dad and I decided to see what, or rather who, was causing the commotion. One man rushed by us, having just had his picture taken with the dark haired celebrity. “Who is it?”, we asked. “I have no idea!” he gushed, still excited that he had a photo of a nameless, but famous, man. When we walked up to the crowd, we could see the tell-tale platinum blonde hair of Gwen Stefani. Her husband, Gavin Rossdale, held their son, Kingston, and gamely posed for pictures with beaming people from the crowd. Gwen waved to the crowd and then took off at breakneck speed in her silver sports car. Our curiosity satisfied, we headed up the hill to join the girls at the merry-go-round.

It‘s unlikely to go through a week in Los Angeles without seeing someone who looks vaguely familiar. Most of them are less well known than Gwen Stefani, people I recognize but don’t know their names - “the brother from My Name is Earl”, “the guy with a wide mouth who used to be on Spin City”. Mostly it’s mildly frustrating because I see someone and just can’t place him or her and then spend the day trying to remember where I’ve seen that person, like having a song at the tip of my tongue.

I don’t consider myself anything more than mildly interested in celebrities. (Full disclosure: my dad will likely disagree with me on this since I did know that David Duchovny was a sex addict and that Kanye West’s mother died of plastic surgery before he read an article to me about it in the paper.) Admittedly, I do like my People magazine from time to time, but given the choice between dinner with my sister or any actor or actress and I’d choose my sister any day, and seeing a smile from Evie on the soccer field is worth seeing 1,000 David Beckhams, However, I’ll admit that there is something fun about living in a place where someone famous might pop up any minute. Running into Gwen Stefani is a story - like the coyote walking down our street a couple months ago, it’s something different from every day life, which is why I think people are interested in celebrities to begin with.

Toby, on the other hand, could not possibly care less about celebrities. I guess I can’t say that completely these days given that his job, and therefore our dinner at night, relies on people’s interest in celebrity life. Still, I challenge you to find someone less interested in celebrity gossip than my husband. In fact, last week he met with Brittney Spears’ managers to discuss a website. The conversation went like this:

Manager: Well, we’ll have to look into that part of it since she doesn’t manage her estate.

Toby: What do you mean?

Manager: Well, you know, since her father has control of her assets.

Toby: Come again?

Manager: Good God, have you been living under a rock? How can you not know about this? Don’t you read those People magazines your wife leaves on the back of the toilet at home?

(OK, I am using an artistic license here, but you get the gist of the conversation.)

Toby’s theory is that our nation’s obsession with celebrities reflects the breakdown of communities: gossiping is a natural human urge and, since we don’t sit with each other on front porches anymore talking about all our neighbors, we look to the television and tabloids to get our fill. I think there’s truth to that and I could probably write plenty about the roll of celebrities in the erosion of American culture or the fact that after reading People magazine, I usually feel more like shopping than like making the world a better place. But for now I’m kind of enjoying the random celebrity sightings as an interesting back drop to life in LA. I’m not about to break out the camera or ask for autographs anytime soon, but I’m not ashamed to report that I pay attention to who is walking around the farmer‘s market on Sunday. So consider this a fair warning: if Zac Efron buys grapefruit or oranges, you’ll hear it here first.