Fame!

At my law school, there was one guy who was considered the most arrogant, and the most grating (and in a law school setting, that is really saying something.) He was a year ahead of me, and was part of the Law Review Board that welcomed me when I got onto law review. Well, the others welcomed me. What he had to say was essentially, "You are all just candidate members of the law review. The emphasis is on the word candidate - we're not afraid to say 'buh-bye'!" Then, he went into a moving speech about how much work it was going to be, and how we were going to have to prove our worth before we could move from being candidate members to the superexalted position of MEMBERS. I started calling him Debbie Allen behind his back because he reminded me of Debbie Allen in the opening to the television show "Fame!" The show was about the N.Y. School for the Performing Arts. In the opening sequence, Debbie Allen pounds a cane into the dance room floor and tells her students "You want fame? It starts right here!"

As I continued to work with 'Debbie Allen', I came to see just how annoying he could be. And that, somehow, I got along with him just fine. Finally, one day he was trying to give me shit about something, and I said to him, "Okay, fine .... DEBBIE ALLEN!"

There was a moment or two of open-mouthed silence as he looked at me. He finally said, "... are you calling me ..... BLACK?!?!?!"

Yes, because there's no question as to why, in the tens of millions of African Americans (let alone actual Africans), I chose a woman. Or someone who is most easily identified and associated with dance. Awesome.

So, here it is: the first episode of the show "Fame!" Check out that 80s wear!!