Almost on Oprah

All the love that Obama is feeling from Oprah these days makes me nostalgic for the time I was close to feeling it, too. My almost-on-Oprah moments, I call them, and I mention them at cocktail parties, fundraising events, and my kid's water polo games because they mean more to people than anything I might have written.  The impulse to tell a story, the specific stories I choose to tell, and the structure I use to tell them are all throwaway topics. The thing that really sticks is Oprah.  If I was almost on her show, then the work I do alone at my desk every day is no longer murky or suspect.  I am, suddenly, a writer of consequence. There's a chance I might even know Dan Brown.

My first just-miss encounter with the woman who can sell more books – and perhaps garner more votes -- in less time than anyone else on the planet came in the middle of the promotional campaign for a memoir I'd written on breast cancer.  An Oprah producer called to screen me for a show that would air the following week.  I answered questions for two hours on everything from mastectomy to motherhood, but didn't make the cut.  The following week a second Oprah producer called for a different show and I did the whole two-hour drill again. I must have said something more inspiring than I had the previous week, because this time, I was summoned to the magic-making Chicago studio.  I was so excited that I raced out and bought a new pair of stockings and a $65 red bra to wear under my perfect-for-TV red suit.  Eleven hours before my flight was to lift off from LAX, however, I was dropped in favor of a famous surgeon.

I had the opportunity to go on The Rosie O'Donnell Show and to watch my book's amazon ranking shoot up for one glorious day, but Rosie simply doesn't pull the same weight as Oprah.  So I do what writers do.  I wrote another book.  Soon after it was published, I went on vacation in the Sierras, where cell phones wouldn't dare ring, and when I got home, there were two emails from an Oprah producer requesting an immediate call back for a show on the Thursday that had just past.  I burst into tears.

"What happened?" my family demanded.

"I missed Oprah," I sobbed.

They nodded, relieved that no one had died.

On Monday morning at 9:01, I called the producer.  I called her again at 1:00 and 4:30.  I emailed her that evening.  I was exactly like a teenager waiting for a boy to call, and everyone knows what to say to such a girl: Forget about him.  I managed to turn off my computer.  I even stepped away from the phone. When my friends and family reminded me of the sweet books I had written for small, satisfied audiences, I smiled and agreed that I am, indeed, lucky.  My books have space in well-lit bookstores all over the country.  My readers sometimes write me to tell me that they've been moved by my stories.  But the truth was that I would never, ever be over Oprah.

Several months after the ill-fated vacation, after hearing me make an "almost on Oprah comment" in front of an audience at a reading, the author of a bestselling book pulled me aside and introduced herself. "I was on Oprah," she said, "And she forgot to hold up my book or say the title.  My publisher printed thousands of extra copies and they all ended up in the shredder."

"And you're OK with this?" I whispered, searching this nice woman's eyes for signs of insanity.

She smiled.  "I'm OK with it."

I felt myself breathe.  I decided, on the spot, to be like her, because I finally understood that it was, in fact, a decision – to believe in myself instead of believing in Oprah.