Incognito Facade in Wackadoodle Man Cave 

Forget acrophobia, claustrophobia and agoraphobia. The medical community can’t cough up a phobia for my main malady. So, I’ll coin the term myself — fame-aphobia.

Yes siree Bob, I fear fame. It started when I became a teenage idol. No nostalgia for me, thanxx. When I recall my overwhelming celebrity as a teenager, I practically shiver.

Sigh.

It all began when high school teachers and fellow students urged me, the uninhibited class zany, to participate in Friday morning convocation programs. 

Without a nerve in my body, I felt like a star performing humorous monologues in front of 1,500 screaming teenagers. I had ‘em rolling in the aisles.

Then came the dreaded noon hour. It seemed like the whole world knew me. Kids would clutter around my table in the cafeteria. 

It felt great to be favored, but ’twas a holy horror for my privacy penchant. Ya see, I’m an extravert but with a decidedly super macho, lone wolf side to my nature.

Talk about self-absorbed. I constantly clowned it up around other classmates — not for attention, but because I was bored out of my gourd. 

After awhile, I became almost oblivious to the laughter of others. I had swept myself off my narcissistic feet and emerged as my bigliest fan — in the classroom or onstage.

However, once I was offstage, I craved  solitude. My poor classmates didn’t realize that I had developed my zaniness at age two as a means to entertain a solitary audience of one — moi.

To escape interruption anxiety, I started leaving the campus at noon and heading to a cafe, but drat the luck, some kids must have stalked me, and they’d head to my table. Never intending to be rude, simply filled with deep devotion.

Sigh.

As much as I utterly understood their adulation, I desperately sought a private wallowing for our mutual fascination with me, but in deep seclusion. Ingeniously, I brown bagged my lunch and hid out in church.

(During the church escape tactic period, I actually became a sporadic religious fanatic, but I digress).

Years passed and then came a collegiate déjà vu of sorts when I wrote a humor column for The Gateway, University of Nebraska at Omaha’s newspaper. 

As hungry people poured into the commissary at noon, they recognized me because my picture appeared weekly with my column. They had inferred that I’d love their company while I chewed. Bummer.

It’s not that I don’t adore the reality of a fan base. I love when today’s readers write that I’ve tickled their funny bones or hit the right notes. That’s especially nice because they express their admiration in writing but not in person. 

I’ve had four websites, but I’ve never published a picture of myself. Honest Irishman. As for pictures in other publications, I dutifully abide by the editors’ requests like any good boy would do.

Strangely enough, I almost miss the mesmerized kids’ interruptions of the past. My fake facade has even deluded me into occasionally pretending that I’m stalked by talent scouts circling my house. Yes.

My private red carpet appearances in my man cave are ogled only by the human and animal images that line my walls. Thank God for the old legend-in-his own-mind syndrome.

Let’s face it, reality can be a dreary bore. I crave mojo. Just as long as it’s private mojo.

I’ve never accepted an invitation for a TV appearance. I’ve repeatedly refused to comment to NYC TV reporter's “man on the street” requests.

And may I assure one and all that my obsession to evade recognition has nothing to do with my being a mastermind cybercriminal in hiding. Sure, there are pictures of me at post offices, but I look nothing like that anymore.

Alone in my wackadoodle man cave, I’m superstar quality. Never a public figure, but the ultimate private dancer.

Images of people and animals adorn my walls, but clearly the star of the cave is the grandiose "Steve Stunning" himself, with guest appearances by my high school alter ego, Studly Dowell. That tramp.

In my wackadoodle man cave, I’m still a two-year-old madly entertaining myself. I still pretend others are lurking about. Sadly, I frequently even dress incognito just for sport. 

Recently, my man cave has functioned as my personal rehearsal hall. Surprise! The merry members of my senior center have requested that I do a weekly standup act. It’s high school all over again — except for one big difference.

Even though the senior center audience goes wild over me, I don’t have to worry about their interrupting my lunch. They’re too old to care. 

Whew???

— Steve Eskew