Brush with Fame

Being a poor immigrant in Toronto with no family or friends to speak of, books became my social life. A psychology student in the 70’s I roomed on Bedford Street near U of T only a few blocks from an extensive collection of books at the local Annex public library. Back then ‘The Annex’ was an interesting community of intellectuals, attracted by the proximity to the University, artists, hippies and “piped-in business men”.
The stacks drew me every weekend, when my, oh, so boring psyche books were read and assignments finished. From there I brought home and devoured mysteries, adventures, dramas, Iris Murdoch’s whole collection of stories, everything except romance. Frankly romance left me cold and somewhat cynical.
One particular Sunday I arrived at my favourite spot only to find a lengthy queue snaking all the way down two blocks past the library front entrance. They must be giving away free books I thought. I went to the back of the line and stood my turn. The line moved at a snail’s pace, giving me time to observe the waiting crowd. As more people arrived I noticed that they were all chatting animatedly and flinging cans of Campbell soup in each other’s faces. There was every variety of soup imaginable, mushroom, chicken, beef, barley, pea, leek and more.
I mustered up some courage to ask a nice-looking, long-haired red head in front of me, “Why the soup?” His eyes opened wide as he looked me over. I was wearing tight jeans and a loose tie-dyed blouse in a rust hue. Finally he said,”Why, so Andy Warhol can sign them, of course”, while snickering to himself at my ignorance. “Don’t you know who he is?’ he added producing his own chicken noodle can from an inside pocket of an army surplus khaki jacket. I nodded affirmatively, then, clarified that I knew very well who Andy Warhol was but did not understand why all the people wanted his signature on a stale soup can?” The red head stuck out his hand towards me and said, “My name is Carl”.