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For a special 10th Year Anniversary edition of the MEIN newsletter, friends and fans of Melissa were asked to write something about her. This is Frank's great contribution:
Melissa! “I (We) love you!!!” How often have you heard that shouted out during an MLE concert? The yell comes from the random fan, sometimes “a woman in need”, the ‘drunken fan’, occasionally from a guy – “Wait that was a man’s voice”. I think we all feel a true good love for MLE. There clearly is also an undercurrent of sexuality in that love – healthy and good, I think, MLE is a beautiful woman.
I
wanted to tell you why I ‘love’ Melissa.
I first saw her live in 2000 at a benefit concert for Los Alamos NM,
which had a few months before endured a devastating forest fire – forcing
the evacuation of some 20,000 people, pets, and belongings packed into their
cars. Unexpectedly, about a
month before that fire, my wife had passed away, and I live in Los Alamos.
MLE did a couple of her songs and then ‘Me and Bobbie McGee’
which was a favorite song of my Janis Joplin loving wife, Beth.
I knew it was time to do more then catch her on the radio and to
listen more carefully to her lyrics. I
was pretty depressed so really resonated with ‘Breakdown’.
Fortunately ‘Skin’ was in the works and was a transition time for
me – I caught the opening show in D.C. and took a girl friend out to
dinner and show (in London) to see the tour’s closing, catching a bunch in between.
I continued trying to see as many concerts as I could.
Early
this year, after losing the charity auction for ‘Lunch with MLE’, she
was gracious enough to do another for the same amount of the winning bid
(making her the biggest fundraiser of the campaign).
Steven Girmant screened me and we had a chance to visit – then the
once-in-a-life time opportunity – an hour and a half one-on-one with MLE,
while she ate pizza, and I the salmon, at a neat Italian restaurant in LA.
It was like 2 old friends catching up over a meal – she is real,
she is beautiful, and she is smart! At
the opening night of the ‘Lucky’ tour at the House of Blues in LA, she
joked about her nuclear physicist and having lunch as being intense (that
was me an honest to goodness Ph.D. Nuclear Physicist).
Melissa, one of the coolest aspects of lunch was when you asked me as
many questions as I asked you, and I assure you that your intellect holds
its own with any other ‘Herr Professor’ I know!
After
that lunch, to quote Emeril – ‘I kicked it up a notch’, deciding not
just to do the Super ME tickets but to go for some Meet and Greets (ended up
doing more than 5) for 2 reasons: 1)MLE
cares about her fans and enjoys the couple minutes of one-on-one, and 2) The
folks who organize them, MEIN/Fan Asylum, are super people and I have made
some good friends, as have the straight and gay ladies who have joined me.
(You know who you areJ).
I
need to tell MEIN members that MLE, as we discussed politics at lunch, had a
pragmatic view. In light of the
election, I am sure she is disappointed, but unlike other superstars there
was no ‘hate’ spread. I
think MLE, and not Michael Moore, can take credit for Bush at least
acknowledging Gay Partnerships as deserving legal rights and the departure
of John Ashcroft as Attorney General.
Melissa
– I love you! I have prayed
for you every day since the report of your illness – I have prayed to my
God – I am convinced he is our God – and also pray ‘W’ knows that
there is no “your God”. Get
well – I am sure you will – you promised me you would do ‘Cherry
Avenue’ in the LA area – you keep your word!
You will not be an “observer” or need a cane to continue your
hypersonic “ride”. (Note to
fans – this is why I am a nuke phys. And MLE does lyrics – I used cane
to equate to quaint and upped super to hyper!)
Happiest
of Holidays to you and your family – please accept this as a poor proxy of
the love your fans, MEIN, and Fan Asylum want you to feel!
Cheers,
Frank
Cverna, YOUR Nuclear Physicist
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