VIP

I just got back from King's Island- an amusement park in the Cincinnati area. It was a fun day overall, but I've got to share the highlight with you. My friend Enola and I decided to wait in the long line for their new ride called the Diamondback. After waiting for an hour or so we decided to wait a few extra minutes to sit in the front row. After we got in the special line they escorted two men our age into line behind us. I had heard someone shout "Hey Jeremy" while we were approaching the front of the line and realized that it was Jeremy Camp (a well-known Christian artist) who was standing next to us in line. I turned around and simply asked him, "Are you Jeremy Camp?" to which he replied with a smile "I am." We then introduced ourselves and had a very pleasant conversation. Enola and I didn't know it but he was to perform later in the evening at the park and so he got to ride a couple of their big rides. The sequence of events that placed him in line right behind us was crazy! It was our first ride of the day, we waited over an hour, he just happened to walk up at that moment, they let us wait to ride in the front row (which they didn't let our friends do later in the day).... The whole experience was fantastic- waiting in line with Jeremy Camp, riding on the front row of their new AMAZING ride...and getting to share it with a great friend.

This all got me thinking...I sure have had more than my fair share of interactions with famous people in the last few years-especially for someone who lives in Indiana. Here are the ones I can think of off the top of my head:

• Riding on a plane with the Newsboys
• Riding on a plane with Ron Luce (founder of Teen Mania Ministries)
• Meeting Norah Jones
• Running into Jim Caviezel at GCC
• Shaking hands with George W Bush (while he was President)
• Shaking hands with Bill and Hillary Clinton (Hillary on 2 different occasions)- I don't care what you think of them it was still incredible to meet a former POTUS
• Meeting Natasha Bedingfield
• Randomly walking by Michael W Smith while on a hike in Nashville
• Talking with Jeremy Camp while in line for a rollercoaster
• Meeting countless leaders in the world of surgery. A couple of surgeons that you might actually be interested in include the neurosurgeon who removed all of Lance Armstrong's brain metastases and one of the surgeons who performed Charlie Weis's gastric bypass surgery/disaster.
• It doesn't count but I almost got to meet Barack Obama. The secret service people were searching us when they bailed out during his campaign.

While I don't place these individuals on pedestals it is fun to interact with them and gain a better appreciation for them as people.