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| The women took off from work to compete in a radio promotion for backstage tickets to meet Donny before the show. When it was time to go in, I tagged along. We were taken to an airy room and told to stand in a line facing forward. The anticipation swelled until, after 10 minutes, Donny appeared in the doorway, his teeth blinding. He was a model of graciousness and warmth. For the next 15 minutes, he unhurriedly made his way down the line, signing anything handed to him, posing for pictures and accepting hugs. Lisa showed him her scrapbook and presented him with a box of Krispy Kreme donuts. (She had done her homework.) At the end of the line, Donny bent over a woman in a wheelchair, speaking quietly to her, and occasionally reaching over to pat her or squeeze her hand. When we got back to the lobby, Lisa, Elaine, and their friend Sue Marks breathlessly detailed the entire 15-minute experience for the rest of their party as though they had just seen a school of mermaids surface in the harbor. Sue could barely speak. "I got a picture of his butt!" she chirped triumphantly. The others paused momentarily, looking at her with something like envy, and then resumed their account. It is after intermission now, and I am sitting next to Sue, a diminutive woman of 44 in a short skirt and enormous glasses. A screen at the rear of the stage lights up with film of Donny performing as a mop-headed youngster, and Sue moans in recognition and delight. When Donny does a duet of "Go Away Little Girl" with his boyhood self on the screen, her face becomes a picture of rapturous pleasure, exactly like those of so many others around her. "Isn't he great," she says to me with a child-like wonder. I smile. Yes, I think, perhaps he is great, even if I can't see it. What counts in this hall tonight is that all these people do see it clearly. The rest of us don't really matter. The moment Donny finishes his final song, I rush up the aisle, leaving him with those who love him and the din of their cheering and applause. When I get home, I will put on Springsteen. Or maybe Sinatra. Yes, that's what I'll do. Copyright � 2001, The Baltimore Sun |
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