I feel like Forrest Gump, traveling obliviously through life touching greatness, being there, yet never a part of it.
Who knew that while listening to Cassius Clay beating Sonny Liston would result in the legend that is Ali. I met Ali, and actually held his huge hands in mine as I showed him how to do a magic trick, facing him and guiding his hands through the motions of a performance. I was just another magic dealer in a booth at a convention in LA, yet there I was. An audience with the King, lasting 5 minutes and touching a piece of history.
Magic has let me touch the hands of Walter Gibson, who I only knew as a magical author and found out later that he was the man who wrote the shadow. My association was superficial, a coattail claim to fame for me. Gibson was gratious enough to endorse a booklet of mine which I asked him to contribute to. I actually needed some routines on an obscure subject, and he had written magic instruction which lent itself to my thesis. The gibson name on my books meant sales and associative fame (not fortune). This was my piece of his time when at age 85, his time was precious.
