Teen Idol

I can die now.

Like most people, I count my high school and college graduations, my wedding day, and the births of my children as my life’s major moments.

Until today.

With apologies to Saguaro High School, ASU, NAU, Husband and the Things, something happened earlier today that trumped them all.

Scott Baio re-tweeted me.

Wait….what??

SCOTT BAIO RE-TWEETED ME.

I can die now.

I couldn’t write this earlier, because it’s literally taken all day for the oxygen to return to my fingertips.

To understand – just a little – the mind-blowingness of this, and the hysteria that ensued (and is still ‘ensuing’ now…10 hours later), I should give you a brief history of my childhood obsession/infatuation/mania with Scott Baio. (Synonyms, I’m aware, but you need to combine all three to get to the level I was at from about 1979-1983.)

Other than my inappropriate ‘older man’ crush on Donny Osmond (it’s no secret I had/have daddy issues), Chachi Arcola was IT for me. I died – along with the studio audience – every time he made his entrance on Happy Days. And I’m quite proud to tell you that I can still sing the theme song to Joanie Loves Chachi by heart.

I’m also not embarrassed to admit that I not only bought his album, but knew the lyrics to every song, and defended his vocal ability to all critics. My best friend and I spent hours lying on my bedroom floor, passing this album cover back and forth, absolutely swooning listening him sing (to us, of course), “Guurrrlll…what was in that kiss, that made me feel like this?”

When I was about ten, my family took a trip to Magic Mountain in California, and upon arrival, we discovered that Scott Baio would be performing LIVE there that day.

I cried.

One, because I was so overwhelmed with emotion and love and adoration and the thought of seeing him in person just crushed me to tears. And two, because I had worn my hair in dog-ears that day.

So, maybe now you can understand how it felt to open up my email this morning and see this –

Your tweet has been retweeted!

“DirectTV canceling Nickelodeon? Screw iCarly and BTR (sorry kids)…@ScottBaio has a new show on this fall! This just got personal.”

Retweeted by
Scott Baio @ScottBaio

(And seriously…DirecTV did just take Nickelodeon away and I WILL be making a call.)

Ask my kids if I went a little ‘berserk.’

If I maybe ran around like I’d just chopped off my fingertip with a butcher knife.

If I paused mid-run to do a strange ‘happy jig,’ and shouted, “HE KNOWS I’M ALIVE! HE KNOWS I’M ALIVE!”

If I had to sit for a moment with my head between my knees, taking deep breaths IN through my nose…OUT through my mouth.

If I fumbled with my phone/iPad/computer, trying desperately to pull up his actual page to see if, in fact, he had re-tweeted me (which I couldn’t do, and Thing 1 had to do for me because my hands were shaking, and because I do not know how Twitter actually works).

He knows I’m alive!

And what is funny is that over the past few months, I’ve had an idea brewin’ for a blog post on how different it is for tweens and teens today to stalk…I mean, stay up-to-date on the daily minute-by-minute happenings of their celebrity crushes.

Thing 1 can tell us (and believe me, she does) 20x a day what the boys of One Direction are doing…what they are eating…who they are kissing…what they are allergic to, and show us photos of them doing it all. Constantly.

Not sayin’ I can’t/don’t do the same with celebrities via Twitter. It’s just so different from when we were kids, and only had access to seeing them if they were on television, or their photo was in the latest issue of Tiger Beat.

Back in the day, celebrities lived their exciting lives mostly in our imaginations. Was it better then? Not sure. More romantic? Absolutely! Nevertheless, I’d have given anything in 1982 to know what Scott Baio ate for dinner, or if I could see current photos of him every day. And it would have absolutely blown my little mind to know that one day, I’d be able to know when he played golf, what he was cooking for breakfast, and seen photos of him out with his family – all on my phone!

And I’d love – LOVE! – to go back in time and tell my 12 year-old self that one day he’d read something I wrote, and he’d like what I said enough that he’d send it along to 50,000 of his friends. But I don’t have to wonder what I’d have done. Flatlined is what I’d have done.

It’ll take me a long time to come down from this one. Thankfully, Husband and the Things are used to my ‘crazy,’ and are very well-aware of the Baio-lovin’ girl who still lives in me. The girl who just had one of her biggest tweeny-boppin’ fantasies come true.

Sigh.

Were you ever madly, head-over-heels in love with a teen idol? Who was he/she? Are your children now going through the same phase?

Michelle Newman is a writer, mom and personal assistant to two hilarious and dramatic daughters, who has been held against her will in Minnesota for the past 15 years. When she’s not at Target or giving her cat insulin injections, she’s writing about her 17 years of being a SAHM, the absurdity of celebrity life, and anything else she can find hidden humor in, over at her blog, You’re My Favorite Today.