My oldest daughter Janey is 11. She wants to be famous. I suppose that's not such an unusual desire, really. It started out with movies. A while back she declared that she wanted to be a movie star. I think that desire came directly after I read a snipet aloud from an article in the paper quoting the many millions of dollars that a child actor had made from making a movie we had seen recently. Janey's jaw dropped. She just started her first babysitting job. She makes $3.50 per hour. She suddenly felt underpaid.
Shortly after that, Janey announced that she wanted to be on a billboard. Side of a bus, next to a highway, didn't matter. It was exposure she was looking for. I asked her what it was about being famous that appealed to her. "Well," she explained, "if I'm famous, that means I'll get to meet other people that are famous. And that's what I want to do." She paused for a moment. "Well, that and the money. I wanna be rich!"
A few days ago, a post card arrived. Her friend McKinley is on a cross country trip. The photo on the front of the card was of Mt. Rushmore. Janey read the greeting, said how much she missed McKinley, and flipped the card back over to the front. As she studied the four enormous faces carved into the side of that mountain, her eyes grew wide and a huge grin swept across her face. She pointed to Lincoln. "That's the guy on the five dollar bill, right?" "Yeah," I replied. "he's also...." Janey cut me off. "I changed my mind. I want to be on Mt. Rushmore!"
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