The phone rings. You answer it. An unknown yet slightly familiar voice speaks.
“Hi. This is __________ (A-list celebrity). I was at an airport and I saw this ___________ (scarf, sweater, shawl, etc.) that I absolutely fell in love with. I approached the person wearing it and asked them where they purchased it and they informed me that you knit it for them. I was wondering if you would be able to knit the same thing for me. Money is no object.”
So after you verify that it truly is George Clooney or Queen Elizabeth II or Riccardo Muti, you pick your jaw off the floor and you make arrangements to actually knit something for Brad Pitt or Oprah Winfrey or Paul McCartney. Then when the check arrives from Meryl Streep or Bill Clinton or Tiger Woods, you never cash it but frame it and hang it proudly on the wall opposite from where you usually knit so it will forever remind you that you are officially a knitter for the stars.
Well not me! Nosiree! Too many things can go wrong. Dealing with celebrities has to be a royal pain. And I’m not just referring to Queen Elizabeth II. These A-listers, I just envision them being really picky and fussy and demanding and the pressure of getting the project just right gets to you and the next thing you know, your hands begin to shake, and once your hands begin to shake, there’s no more knitting and then you can’t feed yourself anymore and you begin to shrink to a shadow of your former self. No thanks!
And then there’s Zsa Zsa Gabor. I’m not quite sure when it started, but for most of my life I have been endlessly fascinated by this woman. I must have been five or six years old when I first heard her name and that was it! I was hooked. It was the sheer sound of her name that got to me first. Zsa Zsa. What a name!. Zsa Zsa! So simple yet so exotic. The Gabor part was just icing on the cake. Zsa Zsa Gabor. What poetry! And then when I was older and I became aware of her life story, … well, … how can one not be slightly bewildered by this woman. Her film career is negligible but her real life story? Wow! I mean nine husbands? Really? Nine husbands? Nine divorce settlements? This woman was a force of nature in her day. She was beautiful (Miss Hungary Paris
For many years I paid homage to Zsa Zsa in a most unusual way. I used to make up stories for my children when they were growing up. These stories had recurring characters so it was an ongoing series of rather unusual adventures. One of the characters was Zsa Zsa Gabor. I regret now that I never wrote these episodes down. The many chapters in that ongoing saga are too faint now for me to try and reconstruct. A shame.
Zsa Zsa is still alive. She is 95 but she has had terrible luck with her health, the one thing money cannot buy. So if I were to get a call saying that Zsa Zsa Gabor would like me to knit something for her, I would not hesitate to say yes. Whatever she wanted. She could ask for socks and I would gladly do it, even though double pointed needles and I do not get along. And no, I would not cash her check and yes, I would indeed have it framed and have it hanging in a most visible and cherished place.
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A handful of correctly completed crossword puzzles from my previous blog have already been turned in. There is still a lot of time. So get those pencils out and get those puzzles in before May 17. First Prize is already set. A pair of Knitter’s Pride Cubics Needles, a brand Cathy has just recently started carrying. Second and third place prizes are still to be determined, but they will be doozies, I’m sure. Maybe for a fourth place prize an 8x10 photgraph of Zsa Zsa Gabor?
