LIFE - IMITATES - ART - IMITATES - LIFE

In my live show, LIFE AND OTHER DECEPTIONS, I talk about coming to realize that maybe our life journey isn’t always about us.   I talk about a little boy called Jamie, who, in the late 80’s, was on holiday with his dad in (the former) Yugoslavia and was staying at a hotel with a family themed entertainment nightclub for English speaking tourists.  

Now, this club was owned by a company called Yugotours and the club itself was run by an 18 year old MC/Magician/gameshow Host and DeeJay called Steve Valentine (it’s a long story).  Every night little Jamie and his dad would come see the show and every night I did a different show,  (I had twelve different shows… yeah… )

Jamie was obsessed with the magic.  I’d meet with them after and do a few extra tricks for Jamie.  It was fun to just take that extra time to connect, and then I’d disappear into the night… to do the things a teenager does when he’s alone in a resort and running a nightclub (yes there’s a script coming on this adventure, but FOCUS) anyway, I didn’t think any more about it.   ​

Now CUT to 2016 and I get a tweet from a dude asking me if I was the same Steve Valentine from Yugoslavia… nervously I say yeah … why?  Turns out it’s this kid, Jamie, and now all grown up. He told me how he had often talked about that holiday, and me, throughout his life and how it had inspired him to… wait for it…  become a professional magician.  I’m especially proud to say, he’s an incredibly brilliant and successful magician, soon to be bringing a show stateside. 

I immediately felt two things, I felt really really old, and really really happy.  You just never know how your actions affect others. We sent a few lovely messages back and forth on twitter and I wished him the best.  It was especially good to hear, because quite often we get so stuck on fighting and working for our goals, that we don’t even realize the powerful ripple effect we all create.

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Now CUT AGAIN to last week, and my friend Dan is in Vegas, calls me and asks, “What’s the name of that kid you mention in your show?  The kid from Yugoslavia days?  I say Jamie Allan, and Dan says “he’s standing right next to me, wanna FaceTime”?  Suddenly there he was,  this little boy, all grown up (I feel sooo oldddddd)  and he started talking about he things HE remembered about that vacation, exploring, with his dad the backstage area, and discovering the room with hundreds of props and tricks that I’d brought to Yugoslavia with me (that’s a yet another story…) 

​What had stuck in his mind was something I’d completely forgotten, THE TRUNK, I had a massive trunk packed with magic tricks.  I had decided to bring as much magic with me as possible and work it all in.  For me, back stage was just an incoherent mess of props, but for this little boy it was an Aladdin’s cave and treasure chest of miracles… He even remembered some of the tricks that were there.  Instantly I was 18 again, and all those memories of the amazing few years I spent there, before the war, came flooding back.

I’m so grateful to Jamie for reaching out and to the fates who stood him next to my friend in Vegas.  

A happy thought that came from this was:  Even if you feel your own life is an incoherent mess… it could still be inspiring to others!  Yes, I’ll admit that cheered me up a bit :)

But I think the universe was sending a reminder that we don’t live life in a vacuum, it’s not about us, and that it really is the journey, and not the destination that matters, because destination is, by its very nature, the end.