The Letter

September 1980; Canandaigua, NY

My sophomore year of high school was underway. After a brief, nail-biting campaign, I was voted Class President. The position came with a slurry of duties related to the impending homecoming week. There was a float to build, Powderpuff Football to organize, Jersey Day to agonize over, and hallways to fill with signs and decorations celebrating the future Class of ‘83.

By this time, I had been in a secret, in-my-head, rivalry with actress Kristy McNichol, (remember tomboy Buddy in the show “Family”?) who seemed to get all of the best rolls on TV and was only two years my senior. I was also still fuming that my mother had refused to take me (although I’m not sure we ever had an actual conversation about it) to New York City in 1977 to audition for Annie on Broadway. Andrea McArdle would go on to have the career that was meant to be mine and live the life of a Broadway star. I was still in high school in a little town on a picturesque lake in Upstate New York. Headed nowhere. There wasn’t even a local community theater production to distract me that year. Just music lessons, JV sports and schoolwork. I was in a funk. I had reached my limit and, one rainy Saturday afternoon, allowed desperation to take over. I was in my room reading a Star Trek fan magazine, no doubt obsessing over William Shatner’s masterful performances as Captain James T. Kirk, and wishing I could run away to Hollywood to start my acting career. Instead, I pulled out the flyer in the back of the Star Trek magazine that advertised the William Shatner Fan Fellowship. Instead of joining, I sat down and penned the following letter, sealed in a large envelope with a black & white head shot and a self-addressed, stamped envelope.