Just Call Me Slyboots

I’ve been sitting here for a little while now, wondering how to start this post. A few minutes ago, I pulled up Google on my browser.

What’s a nice word for stalker? I typed in the search bar.

I guess that’s as good a way to start a post as any.

According to the search results, there really aren’t any nice words for stalker — probably because stalkers aren’t nice. Stalkers are scary… and so appropriately, Merriam-Webster lists the following synonyms: Weasel. Lurker. Sneaker. Spy. Slyboots. (Actually, I kind of like Slyboots. It’s a good band name, if nothing else.) But I have to insist that none of these words really apply to me and my recent actions…  no matter what you might think after reading this tale.

Let me explain.

It all began about ten days ago, when I received a text from a friend we’ll call Joey Coco. His sister was in town from out of state and all the Cocos had all gathered to see her at a popular bar/restaurant on the outskirts of Nashville. I had been invited to come along as well, but already had plans.

Look who showed up here, the text read. It was followed by this photo:

I’ve cropped the photo so that it doesn’t identify the people Joey was taking the picture of — but you probably wouldn’t have been able to identify them, anyway — Almost all of them had their backs to the camera.

Who? I texted back.

Zoom in, he responded.

I zoomed in on the one guy in the photo whose face was actually visible. I was at a loss.

 

Dave Romberg? I texted. He was another friend of ours who looked vaguely like this guy… but not really.

Sigh… Joey texted back. Then he told me whose back he’d taken a photo of  — It was a musician whose show I attend every year with Joey and his family, most of whom were there at the restaurant that evening. It was a funny coincidence that out of all the ‘names’ who could have walked into a Nashville restaurant that night, it happened to be the one musician we all go see each year.

‘That’s so Nashville,’ I thought to myself, and promptly forgot about the whole thing — until a week later, when I went to see a concert featuring Leslie Jordan. Leslie used to be in a band called All Sons and Daughters, which I loved, and I’ve followed her solo career in Nashville ever since the band broke up. She just released an album and was performing it in an intimate listening room, right down the road from my house.

I showed up to the concert with my friend Sami and we took our seats. A band of musicians came onstage to accompany Leslie, and it struck me that the drummer looked strangely familiar… Between songs, I pulled out my phone and pulled up the zoomed-in photo I still had in my texts of ‘Dave Romberg.’ Then I looked at the drummer again. I took a picture of him and texted Joey.

 

Isn’t this they guy who was with [the musician] last week? I wrote.

Joey read my text, then looked back at his photos. I think it may be, he texted back. That’s him, right?

I think it’s him! I wrote. This is so weird. 

I mean, what were the chances?

After the show was over, I showed the photo to a group of Sami’s friends we’d run into at the show and told them the story.

“Oh, that’s definitely him,” one of them said. “Yeah,” another chimed in. “Look, he’s wearing the same shirt and everything.”

I looked down at my phone again. And then I looked over at the drummer, who was now standing a few feet away, talking to some women from the audience.

“I’m going to show it to him,” I said resolutely.

“Oh, you are, are you?” my friend Sami laughed.

“Yes I am,” I said, “because if I were a drummer and someone had a random picture of me on their phone from a restaurant I was at a week ago, I WOULD WANT TO KNOW.”

I mean, it makes perfect sense, right?

…Right?

And of course, my friend caught the whole thing on video. I turned it into a GIF so there’s no audio, but what I’m saying to the camera before I walk over there is, “This might be the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done.” That was sadly not the case, but there’s a good chance it was the most embarrassing thing I did last week. Anyway.

 

“Excuse me, is this you?” I asked the drummer, before showing him the photo on my phone.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he said in a friendly way, as if strangers walked up to him all the time holding random photos of him standing outside a restaurant. But after a moment, I could see some Stages of Realization start to set in.

First, there was Confusion. ‘Why does this woman have a photo of me on her phone?’

This was quickly followed by Dismay. ‘When was this picture taken? And why? And why is this woman showing it to me now?’ 

Before he could get to Panic (‘Security!’), I tried to explain: “So I always go with my friend’s family to see [famous musician] do [famous musician’s annual show] each year, and my friend was at a restaurant over in Goodlettsville last week with his family and you guys walked in and he took a picture of the whole group and said, ‘You’ll never guess who showed up,’ only it was a bunch of people’s backs, so I zoomed in on you and named a guy we know that looks sort of like you and we had a good laugh and then he told me he had actually taken the picture of [famous musician’s] back and I forgot about the whole thing but then I saw you on stage tonight and thought you looked strangely familiar and I looked back through my photos and it was you the Dave Romberg lookalike and I mean what are the chances and then I felt obligated to let you know I have these pictures of you on my phone and this isn’t creepy at all right?”

He laughed a little and was very nice about it and, well, I can only imagine how he tells this story to his friends now. “Fame’s a bitch and fans are weird,” is how I’m guessing it ends. “I might have a stalker,” is how I’m hoping it doesn’t end.

Sadly, there’s no moral here and no tidy ending. I didn’t end up having drinks with the drummer and his lady friends. He didn’t chuckle and call me ‘Slyboots.’ We didn’t exchange Instagram handles. I just thought you’d want to know a little more about what happens to me now that I’m a glamorous divorced lady, mostly because as it turns out, embarrassing moments are still occurring on an almost daily basis, much like they did back when I was married and herding kids around — It’s just that they happen in clubs sometimes now, as opposed to the Kroger.