On a phone call Thursday morning, I tried to impress a former White House speechwriter by mentioning casually that I would be attending the insider-famous Gridiron Dinner Saturday night—invited by a Washington Speechwriter Friend of our mutual acquaintance.
Was she going? No, she wasn’t. “I wish I were,” she said, graciously.
My mission suavely accomplished, I then heard myself blurt out, “I’ve never worn a tuxedo before!” (“How can that be?” she muttered in genuine wonder.)
My subtle sense of insecurity must have also been detected by the woman barber in my Chicago neighborhood Thursday afternoon, to whom I went for a beard trim. To explain this extravagance, I told her I wanted to look tidy for a fancy dinner I would be attending over the weekend. I mentioned that our governor, J.B. Pritzker, would be speaking. And that I would be wearing a tuxedo (with tails!).
A scheduled 15-minute appointment ran to 30, as she prepped me meticulously for the big event.
At one point, she asked, “Are you going to have a few notecards in your pockets?”
“What for?” I asked.
“Maybe with just a few things on them, to say to people.”
“Good idea,” I told her.
And then I reassured her that I’d have a notebook, instead. To write things down, that I heard from other people.
“Oh, that’s a good idea,” she said.
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