Last evening my wife and I attended a little get together at my general manager's apartment with my co-workers and some friends. Karen, my GMs daughter flew in from Philadelphia. She has been a Ray Bradbury fan for many years and we had discussed this fact on the phone on several occasions when Karen called for her father.

I brought some of the correspondence with me that had transpired between Ray and myself over the years and Karen enjoyed reading through the letters and post cards. I had also brought along a couple of books that Ray had autographed and illustrated for me. Then I asked Karen if she would like to say hello to Ray. Well, she couldn't believe that there might be that opportunity, but it was 6:15 PM in California (we are in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida) and I called. Ray sounded so great and enthusiastic. I told him that I feared waking him from a nap, but he said that he just gotten up from a nap. I told him that there was a young lady who would love to say hello to him and he asked me her name.

I handed my cell phone and she visited with Ray for the next five or six minutes. He was looking forward to attending a book signing at a Barnes and Noble later today.

Karen's comment was she couldn't believe how kind and sweet Ray was on the phone. She hung up and told me Ray had asked her to give me a big hug. What a guy.

One more experience. It was a Wednesday night, the night when Mars was the closest to the Earth and I was at a park that had a observatory and a friend of mine had one of his telescopes set up along with several others. They were patiently letting people who had come out to look through the observatory's telescope, look through their telescopes since the line was so long at the observatory.

I happened to get into a conversation with three young people and we got to talking about Ray and The Martian Chronicles. I mentioned that I had been writing back and forth to Ray for many years and they found this interesting as they were all fans of his.

It was about a week before that I had called Ray and asked him how he felt about Mars being so close and he mentioned that he was very excited and that the Interplanetary Society was throwing a bash for him to coincide with his birthday.

Well, I thought I would call him that night a leave a message on his answering machine. But when I called he answered the phone. I said, "Ray, I thought that you would be at the celebration," and he replied that the bash had been the previous Saturday night.
So I said, "Ray, I have a couple of young fans here with me that would like to say hello. He said to put them on, and they couldn't believe that they were being able to speak with Ray Bradbury.

I don't have the opportunity to do this often and I try not to abuse the privilege of having Ray's phone number, but he always is so gracious and seems to enjoy the calls.

Wow! This is the longest post that I have written, but wanted to share this with you all.

[This message has been edited by biplane1 (edited 12-04-2004).]

[This message has been edited by biplane1 (edited 12-04-2004).]