A stupid brush with fame

Yesterday I was at a campus greeting people in the lobby after service when a sharp guy about my age introduced himself. He said he had committed his life to Christ a few months ago and had been baptized at Seacoast this past winter. He then began to explain his life situation which is, to put it mildly, complicated. I asked him what he did for a living and he said that he is a retired musician. I have never met a retired musician before, especially one in their mid-forties. Musicians tend to starve rather than retire. I started to ask him what exactly he had retired from, but I decided to leave it alone.

In the car on the way back I asked Jeanne Radekopf (several of us had traveled together to the campus) if she knew any more about the guy's story. Since Jeanne is a worship pastor at Seacoast I figured she might know more about retired musicians and their complicated lives. Actually she knew his story quite well. It turns out he was a member of a band that everyone in America over the age of 12 has heard of. In fact you probably own at least one of his albums, and you definitely have had his songs stuck in your head for at least a decade. He is a retired musician because when you sell as many albums as he has you don't need to work again, and everyone knows your name.

Everyone but me.

I'm glad I didn't ask him what he retired from.

Comments

[Pete Wilson]

Don't feel bad.

Peter Cetera, the lead singer for Chicago came up and introduced himself a few weeks ago at Cross Point.

I had no clue who he was or who Chicago was and several older staff had to explain to me.

I felt stupid.

[kenn jameson]

what band was he a part of?

[Geoff Surratt]

Thanks for the kind spin on my stupidity Colleen :) Obviously my wife is much sharper than me.

[Colleen Foshee]

Hi Geoff,
I had the pleasure of meeting your wife in Dallas at our Provenway event. Glad to find you both on Twitter. Your story made me laugh this morning - something we need more of every day. I love your transparency and willingness to share less than perfect moments. Lately God has been leading me to do more and more of that with fantastic results. People will settle in with "less than perfect". They hide from "all that". By the way, it struck me that maybe the man needed obscurity. Otherwise you might not have been as focused to listen to his complicated story. I bet he gained by your loss. First will be last going on unwittingly...