The saying goes, “Never meet your idols.” This is, presumably, because the people whom you admire the most will inevitably disappoint you with their mere humanity. But let me tell you, this was not the case with Neil Gaiman. When I gave him a Dr. Radium print after he spoke at my university, he invited me to lunch with him and some of the university faculty. He was gracious and charming, and he sat in a Japanese restaurant with the light from the window behind him glowing around his head like a halo. Seriously.
Me? I had unwittingly inspired the devotion of a small boy who was along with us, and spent most of lunch trying to juggle playing a game of Hangman with this boy and approximating intelligent adult conversation. Then, small boy finally gone, I found myself walking down the street next to Neil Gaiman.
You have to understand: Like 99% of comics-reading women my age with all-black wardrobes, I first fell in love with a comic when I read The Sandman. Neil Gaiman and his creation is, as my agonized thought balloon tells you, the reason I work in comics. (And not just because of the work itself — seeing women at the editing and art helms informed me of possibilities.)
So I was walking down the street with Neil Gaiman in a hero-worship-induced state of utter stupidity, and, yes, those are the words that escaped from my lips. And he was gracious and charming enough to still talk to me after that.
Oh god.
June 26th, 2008 at 9:07 pm
…ain’t that the truth?
June 26th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
It could have been worse. It could have been bees. http://yarnpirate.blogspot.com/2007/04/true-story.html
June 27th, 2008 at 12:34 am
looks like you handled yourself admirably to me.
June 27th, 2008 at 1:19 am
and anyway, it *did* smell mysteriously like onion rings.
June 27th, 2008 at 9:13 am
http://yarnpirate.blogspot.com/
June 27th, 2008 at 9:15 am
Please ignore that link I just put above for yarn pirate. I erred. What I was going to post was:
Neil Gaiman knows bees.
June 27th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
NOT THE BEES! NOT THE BEES!
June 28th, 2008 at 5:15 pm
I met Neil at the SDCC some years ago (he read for the CBLDF a part of his then-nearly-finished novel Coraline), and he was gracious with all of us that fumbled and mumbled and made awkward noises instead of talking properly. Of course, my Mexican accent probably didn’t help my case, but I digress.
I still have the Polaroid someone was gracious enough to take of us, which Neil then got to mess around before it was developed. “It’s something Dave McKean showed how to do”. I left smiling. And later on took a Polaroid of Neil with Frank Miller, Diana Schultz and Chris Oar. Yep, that was my Polaroid summer. heh.
June 30th, 2008 at 4:57 am
I’ve met Neil three times.
The first time I was so tongue-tied I merely giggled, then blushed when he said he liked my shirt.
The second time I said “my name is like her name” when asking him to sign Wolves in the Walls.
The third time, I actually formed entire sentences. They may have been spoken three times as fast as usual, but were whole sentences.
The kicker? I’m an adult woman with a Masters degree. I’m not actually a five year old girl with a crush.
I think he’s got some sort of aura…
June 30th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Exactly, Ananke! It’s an aura that cripples the minds of adult women with Master’s degrees!
I figured out where the onion ring smell comes from, though, Neil. It’s the Johnny Rockets. So at least I have that.
August 24th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
I think it would be really awkward if Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane happened to be standing on the same street corner.