If you could have dinner with a celebrity. . .

. . . who would it be?

My husband is a relatively serious open water distance swimmer.  He began training a year and a half ago.  He swam about a dozen events last summer, including the 10-mile Kingdom Swim in Newport, Vermont.  For non-swimmers like me, that's like a 40-mile run.  Today he swam 13.2 miles in the Hudson River (Stage 3 of the 8 Bridges Swim).

Every activity has its own celebrities, and open water distance swimming is no exception.  My husband keeps up with blogs and forums on the topic, so he knows the names of the top-notch athletes and some of their most impressive feats and records.

Today there were only three swimmers swimming the event, a kayaker for each, and a handful of support crew, including the event organizers (who are incredible and well-known open water swimmers) a true world-class celebrity of the sport.

I didn't realize who she was until after the event, and then said to my husband: "Oh, wow, she carried your box of gatorade and water to the boat!"  It was a heavy, unwieldy box, the dock to the boat was long, and it now seemed like that much more of a favor.

She also paced him for about ten minutes late in the swim, which gave him a huge morale boost.  She told us later that he sped way up while she was pacing him.

Eight of us - another swimmer and his wife, one organizer, and a few of the support staff including the celebrity - went out to dinner after the swim.  It was incredible to be able to ask the organizer about his English channel swim and the celebrity what her next challenge will be.  This really isn't my area of expertise so I made a few gaffes, like asking which direction he swam the English channel.  (Apparently the French have not allowed anyone to swim from France to England for decades.)  But mostly I felt like I was living out the answer to. . . "If you could have dinner with anyone in the world, who would it be?"

I used to always answer "Abraham Lincoln" (I think the question usually was posed to me as "any historical figure") and I sometimes tried to picture that dinner.  It was hard for me to imagine it being anything other than awkward.  I would be so shy and so unsure of what questions I should ask or what we should talk about.

But dinner tonight was a delight!  My husband can be socially shy, so I felt it my duty to find out as many things as he might want to know and engage the celebrity in as much conversation as I could.  It was quite easy, as she was charming and funny and quite happy to talk. 

What I love most is that to most of the world, she is not a celebrity.  No one in the restaurant knew who she was.  None of the waiters were lining up for autographs.  She is a world-class open water swimmer, holding a record for a channel swim among other impressive feats, yet outside of the tiny world of open water swimming she is unknown. 

Every activity has its own celebrities, special only to those in the know.  How perfect to be a normal person to most people and a celebrity only to those who understand and appreciate your talent.

Dining with our celebrity tonight, my husband and I were dazzled.