15 Minutes of ... Wait, Don't Tell Me... Is it Cheese?

Saturday was really quiet at the salon. I had to go get my bi-monthly fingernail tune up and was prepared to practically sleep through my appointment, as usual.

There was a woman there who I had never seen before. She was conversing with my manicurist, so I was able to hear that she was in on her "off" Saturday due to scheduling conflicts. And who cares, right? Least of all me, who as stated above, wants nothing more than to doze through the process and be shot back out into the world so I can go home and watch t.v. on my couch.

However, this particular Saturday having been the Thanksgiving Weekend, made it really really quiet in the salon. There was only one other manicurist in there, with her own sleepy client. My manicurist started up a conversation with the off Saturday lady ("OSL"). Before long, OSL offered that she had to go out of town next week to do some training in New Mexico. And that she was cooking a huge meal "tonight" and had to find an Italian supply shop to buy some key ingredients.

Because I'm as bright as the moon on a moonless night, I opened up my yap and offered that I knew of a local Italian supply store that might help her with what she needed. She responded to my nugget of advice by affixing the site of her Unwanted Verbal Fact Cannon on my heart. I was annoyed at myself, until OSL began to share with the entire room - her claim to fame. Although she does not call it fame.

What? I know. It doesn't quite make sense yet. Stay with me.

OSL is from Roswell, NM. She was born in April 1947. Without any of us asking, she informed us that was the site of the alien crash landing, and that it happened in 1947. And that the aliens came to her parents' house and switched out her mom's human baby for her. Which I thought was kinda decent for aliens, since they could have just taken the human baby and left nothing. Right? OSL, her friends and family have and do know all of the key people in the Roswell Crash Story, Myth, Parable - whatever. At this point my love of the Lunatic Fringe began to show and I was unable to keep my body from physically jerking when she'd proceed to another thread of the story. Baby coffins and secret this and that - she personally knows people. But until 20 years ago, she says she was never permitted to discuss the events outside of her home. When asked why (and not by me, because I was paralyzed with fear and glee while these things were being said), she said "Because they kept disappearing. All the nurses involved in the event, they all disappeared."

I've always felt like this conversation would be had in front of me or by me, but I always imagined it would involve a homeless person or an institution in the background.

OSL began to wind down her story by saying "I had my 15 minutes of ..." and she was searching for the word. She motioned to us in the room in that universal "help me fill in the blank" way that people do. When I offered up "fame", she said "NO!..that's not it" and waved the universal hand gesture for "idiot" at me. She decided to finish her sentence all on her own: "I had my 15 minutes of ...... but I was too young to enjoy it."

She didn't fill in the missing word. I MUST KNOW WHAT WORD SHE WANTED, but I cannot and will not ever know. Apparently it wasn't fame. Maybe alien babies are immune to our human fame. Perhaps she said the word, but like only dogs can hear certain pitches, we humans aren't equipped to know what her 15 minutes is called.