I'm writing from a couple weeks back.

I’m on a plane again, that same American Airlines flight I took with Johnny Wink to Grand Rapids, when someone taps me on my shoulder and says, “Are you Eli Cranor?”

As much as I’d like to tell you this happens often, it doesn’t. But if it does, it’s usually because of—

“Your column,” the lady says. “I really love your column.”

Not my novels. Which is weird. Maybe it’s because my picture is at the top of every column? Maybe people just don’t look at the author's picture on the back flap of books.

“I haven’t read your novels,” she says, “but I like reading about your kids. And that house on the lake? Just beautiful.”

It’s also weird to talk about my kids and my house with a stranger. But I asked for it. I mean, I’m the one who broadcasts his life each week for mass consumption. And this lady seems nice enough. She seems to be around the same age as my mom. She kind of looks like my mom. She probably knows about my mom being a kindergarten teacher from Forrest City.

That’s where my mind goes as this sweet lady, a reader of my column, the very column you’re reading right now, tells me of her upcoming travels. I can’t recall the exact locations. Somewhere in Europe, I think. But I can recall getting the faintest whiff of what it must feel like to be truly famous.

Buy Eli Cranor's books - #Commissions Earned

I’ve often said that being an author is the lowest level of rockstar. I usually say this before I pull out my guitar at a book event and strum my way through a Johnny Cash tune (sidenote: another woman, not the nice lady on the plane, once told me, after one of my impromptu “gigs,” that I should stick to writing books).

And it’s true: authors really are at the bottom of the rockstar barrel.

Outside of John Grisham and Stephen King, almost any other current bestselling novelist could walk through the Clinton National Airport without being stopped by a single adoring fan.

I don’t blame this on declining reading habits in America. No! I’m no Schopenhauer. I’m an optimist! I’m sticking with my author-photo theory, a theory that apparently does not apply when it comes to columns in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

In the end, I thanked the kind lady, wished her safe travels, and then I settled in for our connecting flight to Chicago. As the plane backed onto the tarmac, however, a thought hit me hard enough that it jolted me from my seat.

“Excuse me, ma’am?” I said, the upper half of my torso twisted, trying to get the kind lady’s attention again. “What’s your name?”

She did not hesitate. She said, “Laura McNutt," and smiled. "Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why’d you want to know my name?”

And I said six words I'd almost forgotten, six words I did forget, actually, all the way up until it was time to sit down and write this week’s column:

“I’m going to make you famous.”

VISIT www.elicranor.com
JOIN my monthly newsletter
GET THE BOOKS!