Many moons ago there was a social media platform called Myspace. It was absolute magic for us back in the early 2000’s. You could pick your top friends to display on your main screen, design your own layout and have music play on your profile, so each person’s page could be unique to that user. In September 2007 as I scrolled through the Myspace bulletin section which was pretty much the equivalent to Facebook’s newsfeed or Twitter’s TL, I saw an announcement that Val Kilmer was going to be making an appearance at a charity classic car show in Bronx, NY. I love classic cars and was always an admirer of Val’s work. I called up a friend of mine to see if she would want to go with me and we made our plans. The night before we were due to drive there, I went to the Real Deal Val Kilmer’s page (which is what it was titled) and sent a quick message asking when Val would be there. I wanted to make sure we didn’t miss him. The next morning I went into my email and saw an email stating I had a new message from Val Kilmer on Myspace, went into the message and see the following:
“I’ll be there all darn day. xox Val”
I assumed this was sent by a person helping run his page but it was still pretty cool to see that message. We made it to the event and found Val right away. I saw him sitting at a table and walked up, my friend in tow, and asked straight out if he would take a photo with me. I honestly didn’t know who I was in that moment. I had walked straight up to one of my acting idols, like it was no big deal. He responded with a smile and “Sure”, got up and stood next to me for my friend to take the photo. As we stood there posing, I suddenly hear his voice right next to my ear asking me which car was my favorite. For a moment I thought “Is he talking to me?” and he was. We then started talking about classic cars and the GTO he owned and had some laughs throughout our chat. He was so unbelievably funny and sweet. At that time he had made a CD with a friend of his, where he turned some of his poetry into songs, so I purchased that. Later that evening he messaged me, on Myspace, asking what I thought of the CD. Once again the message was signed xox Val. I discovered it really was him that messaged me back that morning. After that I ended up actually becoming friends with his website manager, I started a group page dedicated to him on Myspace, was among his top 20 friends list and even got a personal birthday wish posted by him on my page. Eventually everyone transitioned to Facebook (I still curse that day and miss Myspace) and when things went south with the person running his fan page on Facebook, I was asked to take that over. Over the years my little association with him lead to opportunities like writing for an online magazine and just getting to know a bunch of truly great people. I never anticipated a little photo op with someone of his caliber would impact my life in such a way but it did and I’ll never forget that moment.
Stardust Musings 