I Survived ... Clay

slg111 finally shared her account of sitting on the same stage as Clay. She was lucky enough to receive an all-access pass at last week's Jimmy Kimmel taping.

Okay. Here goes. I’ll tell as much detail as I can remember. I got in, as you know, because George Lopez is a parent at my school. His wife put it together for me. I got there about 6:30 or 6:45, just in time to see Clay’s ADT rehearsal. I was able to pull my car in the lot right behind the stage, and then I dallied around so that I watch the rehearsal. When it seemed like they were through I asked a security guard what next. After much checking and rechecking, they took me through the studio to George’s dressing room. No one was there but me! It was the dressing room from the fight skit, because I recognized the set up, especially where Clay was sitting (at the make up mirror) when Jimmy first comes in.

So after a while the make-up girl shows up – apparently she is George’s personal make-up artist… does gigs like this and also at his show. Very nice person, easy to talk with. About 7:15 George and Ann arrive. Ann is the most fun, gregarious, enthusiastic, energetic person you could ever imagine. George, believe it or not, in real life, is very reserved – polite, cordial – but that crazy personality is his stage persona only. I think that’s pretty cool.

Soon after, the producer of George’s segment comes into say hi. I guess each guest has their own producer and they talk. Meanwhile other people are coming and going constantly – very merry go round. I perked up with CLAY’s producer came in to say hello. Small, older man who looked just like a producer. What he said to them was very funny – he wanted to say hello, but he had to hurry back because Clay is a very “clingy” guest. He only likes this guy to produce him and likes him to be around. (The dressing room was on the other side of the wall of the one I was in! ) Ann, bless her heart, pipes up and says, “This is my friend, slg, and she’s really like a chance to meet Clay.” I also had a bag for him that I wanted to give him – I had put two books, The Secret Life of Bees and Lovely Bones in it, as well as a three-pack of that Dentyne Fire gum he has said he likes. Anyway, the producer guys says he’ll see what he can do.

Time goes by. The show is getting ready to start. Still no sign of Clay. I see Andy Abad (very cute) and a couple band members in the green room playing pool. It’s bizarre. The “green room” is like a mini-club. There are big TVs on the wall with couches and chairs in front of the TVs and little bar type tables and chairs against the other wall. There’s another room off the main room with a pool table. There’s also a bar and a place where they set up all this catered food – very GOOD quality catered food.

The show starts. We watch the monologue and the cousin segment from the green room. We go back to George’s dressing room to watch his segment from there. A couple guys come back with us, along with George’s publicist. These guys were the producers of George’s comedy CD and they had an interesting talk about what kind of numbers are predicted for comedy CDs versus music CDs and what is considered successful. I enjoyed listening because we talk so much about that stuff on the board. These guys are both in their late 20s, early 30s, very hip.

George’s segment ends. I begin to feel kind of bummed, because I thought to myself, if I don’t get to meet Clay, I’d rather be in the audience watching his segment than in George’s dressing room. During the commercial break before Clay, I decide I better give my bag to someone on his team, so at least he’ll get that. I spot Jerome… MY GOD HE IS SO GIGANTIC. I meekly ask him if I would please get the bag to Clay. He asked if there was a card, I say no. Ann weighs in – she says, tell him it’s from the teacher I talked to him about in Canada. Jerome was very kind and said he’d make sure Clay got it and that he knew who it was from.

So we go back to watch Clay’s segment, which of course was a riot. I love this part. Somewhere towards the end of it, one of those hip guys, George’s music producers, turns to me and said, “You know what, I’m surprised. I think I like Clay Aiken!” The other one chimes in his agreement. I said, “Yeah, he’s really a lot of fun to watch on interviews.” Inwardly, I’m chuckling because Clay really draws you in whenever he talks… even hip guys who would never have thought in a million years they would like him.
Also during this time, someone brings me back a Sprint bill… when I gave Jerome the bag with books and gum in it, I had totally forgotten that I had also put my Sprint bill and two CDs in there – the Sprint bill had Ann’s cell on it in case I had a problem, and the two CDs were possibly to get them autographed. How funny. He gets this bag from me – here I’m giving you two of your own CDs. Yikes! Anyway, the guy says, I think this is yours, giving me the bill, and these are yours two… gives me back the CDs, which are both signed twice, both on the cover and the CD itself in pretty silver ink. Amazing.

The segment is ending and I see Ann kind of rushing around. I’m not paying too much attention because I want to hear every word he says, of course. Jimmy and Clay start talking about the fact he‘s going to sing, and she says, we have to go now! I’m like go where? Somewhere in all of this someone has given me a badge and told me to put it where it can be seen. I don’t really even look at it, because I think Clay was still talking. Later I look at it and it says, CLAY AIKEN: ALL ACCESS PASS. Yowza! Ann says, we’re gonna go on the stage and watch him from there. I’m like, OMG, that’s so cool! So we rush down this little hallway along with a bunch of other people and come to the ramp that leads up the stage. It kind of bottlenecks and we’re standing there waiting. I suddenly notice that Clay is about two feet from me, talking to a couple people. My whole body freezes, and I murmur to Ann, “Clay’s right there!”

No pause. She brays, best word for it, in the BEST sense of the word, CLAY!!!! CLAY!!!!! He turns and sees her and she waves him over, “Come here, come here!” My heart starts pounding. He sees her, cuts through the two people, and she says something about wanting him to meet me. I couldn’t even focus on what she was saying. My world shrank and it only contained his face, his eyes looking directly into mine, taking my hand for a good two or three seconds, asking me, what was my name again? I know I replied, but I was thinking about his hand – it was so smooth, very warm and very large. He is totally gorgeous and very tall. Ann was talking, probably about me being the one she had gotten his autograph for back in Canada. He smiled, I don’t know what he said, but then he was gone. He was actually on his way to the stage when she stopped him.

I stood for a while with the other people on stage right, and just as he was entering the stage with everyone cheering, someone ushered Ann and me to the couch. I was like, this is not believable. This is not real. I am sitting on stage with Clay, George Lopez to my right, and Jimmy Kimmel beside him, and Clay is right in front of me. At one point, George and Jimmy both got up to do something, and when they sat down again, Jimmy sat next to me. I really was having trouble grasping everything.

The whole concert was so surreal. Watching Clay, seeing the sea of people, feeling the flow of love between him and his audience – that’s where he is so different than any other performer. No one connects to an audience like he does.

When the concert was over, he was making his way off stage and Ann stops him and tells him how unbelievably awesome he is, and would he mind taking a picture with me. She has no fear! No shame! Thank goodness. Clay -- no hesitation (I’m sure he was itching to get back to his dressing room) – he says sure. Somewhere in there I ask him if he got my books. He smiles, says yes, "I've read the Bees one, but not the other one..." Then he gets slightly behind me and puts his hands on my shoulders. That ABOUT did me in. To feel his hands lightly on my shoulders. Lord. This is funny – so we’re in position for the picture and nothing happens. I really can’t think about anything except that his hands are on my shoulders, and I hear him say something, but it was a jumble in my ear because all I could think about was the feel of his hands on my shoulders. We’re still standing there. I begin to realize something is wrong – I look up at him right when he’s telling Ann again, “You have to turn the camera on…” in that lovable southern drawl. He looks down at me and makes one of those funny faces like, “Well, duh…” Ann is like oh! So she snaps the picture finally. I thank him, tell him I think he’s wonderful, and he’s gone.

So just fleeting moments with Clay, but more than I could have ever hoped for or wished for. It’s hard to make people understand how we feel about him. And to have that depth of feeling for a person for so long, and to know that that feeling is never ever going to change – to suddenly have that person, in the flesh, right in front of you, touching you – it’s just unreal.

I met him briefly once before at a Meet and Greet in Ohio for the JBT. That was nothing like this. He was nice, but it was so quick, and I was lined up with other people. This was in the midst of an electric night – everyone surrounding Clay, the amazing enthusiasm and love from his fans, people running around backstage doing their jobs. The cool night air, filled with his voice and then the quiet after – but noisy still, with that controlled chaos that is giving a performance like he did.

It was a night I will never ever ever forget. The whole experience of being backstage the whole time, the moments with Clay, the amazing concert – I gave George and Ann a card the next day that said among other things, “If I said thank you a million times, it wouldn’t be enough.”

Technorati tags: Clay Aiken, A Thousand Different Ways, ATDW, American Idol, Without You, Invisible