I kind of admire the Über Fan. It must be hard, not to mention exhausting, to live with that much conviction. Like working on breakfast television, or being a vegan, or believing in god… the pure emotional drain of being so freaking sincere about one thing all the time must take its toll (especially if it involves not eating steak).
I like Coldplay, for brief periods of time. I enjoy tuna mornay, but life experience has taught me that it doesn’t taste nearly as good on the fourth day. I’m partial to Russell Crowe, as long as he’s being someone else.
But Über Fans… they don’t qualify their love. Their love is pure, eternal, slightly unnerving.
Imagine being so committed to a pop star you have a calendar of him at your work station. Now imagine that pop star is Darren Hayes… and it is 10 years since Savage Garden* broke up. I don’t want to call my colleague Helena ‘Darren’s Number 1 Fan’, but she must come fairly close. She once considered putting a sticker of Darren’s web site on the back of her car, to try and push more people to check it out. When his latest single was officially released she got up at midnight to listen to it, and spent the day touring the office so everyone could sample it from her ipod. She once referred to Darren has her ‘Horcrux’… which, for the non-Harry Potter fans in the room, means he contains a part of her soul, so if he dies a part of her dies. Helena then admitted that she occasionally switches on the news and thinks to herself, ‘God I hope Darren hasn’t died’.
She knows, as a woman, she’s not Darren’s type. That’s not the point. Somehow, at some formative point in her life, Darren took some chaste part of her heart, and her dedication hasn’t faltered since.
LJ: (after one solid Helena monologue about her Darren Dedication) You aren't fickle in your love are you.
Painefull: You certainly don't blow with the winds of fate.
H: No. (triumphant, she continues) I don't blow... (head tilt) well...
Usually you’d call something like this a phase. Like when Livinia wrote fan fiction about Hanson**, or when Peta and Calliope tried online dating, or when Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tiger Woods tried monogamy. But it’s been well past a decade now, and Helena’s love goes on like a power ballad over a sinking ship. There’s no stopping it.
Yes, I kind of do admire the Über Fan. They put the ‘madly’ in ‘Truly, Madly, Deeply’. And I suppose someone’s got to balance out the painful amount of cynicism people like me bring into the world.
Painefull Out
* = Savage Garden, the 90’s go-to Aussie band for songs that were catchy initially, but more annoying each time you heard them (as opposed to the name of The Be Sharps, which needed to be witty initially, but less funny each time you heard it).
** = Hanson, the trio of brothers responsible for 'MMMBop'. Go on, hum it. See if someone nearby hits you.
*** = This one goes out to Helena...
Caption: Oh there she is, so it's true, she did buy 5 tickets to my Sydney concert.
