"When you're No. 1 in the world ... you're like a god to (people)." Burt Reynolds made that statement a few years ago. It was reported in the Chicago Tribune in an article written by Howard Reich. Mr. Reynolds had come to Chicago with his one-man stage show. The show was titled: "An Evening With Burt Reynolds: The Laughs, the Loves, the Legends, the Lies (Not Necessarily in That Order)." Howard Reich interviewed Mr. Reynolds while Reynolds was in Chicago for the show.

Burt Reynolds, of course, made a marvelous name for himself in show business. From 1977 to 1982 he was the No. 1 box office draw in the world. That's fame all right. That's a name all right. "It was an incredible, extraordinary experience," Reynolds is quoted as saying. "It's almost impossible to explain what it feels like to be that big in the first place. When you're No. 1 in the world (it means) you go to China and Bali, and you get off a plane, and they know you. And they not only know you ... you're like a god to them."

Burt Reynolds knew what it was like to be No. 1. He knew what it was like to be "like a god" to people. He had achieved a great name for himself. But, as with any achievement we make as humans, it can be taken from us in an instant. Being "like a god" to people never lasts. The gods always come crashing down. So did Burt Reynolds. And he was miserable. "You're going to find yourself so unhappy after you're No. 1," he was quoted as saying. "There's only one way to go. You can't stay there, so you're going to drop eventually, and you have to prepare yourself for that." 71 Mr. Reynolds paid a steep price for falling from his No. 1 ranking. Being god, he discovered, was very hard on his body. "I was tired, depressed, hyperventilating, fainting all the time," he said in the interview. There were rumors at the time that he was dying from AIDS. His friends quickly deserted him! "When you're dropped by everyone the way I was," Reynolds said, "you need an enormous faith in God or Zen or Buddha or whatever. If you don't have something, you're going to go directly to whatever puts you out of this world, whatever pill, whatever you smoke, whatever you can stick in your arm, whatever you can drink."

"There's a saying in the South," said Reynolds, "that no man is a man until his father tells him he is. Well, my father unfortunately didn't tell me until I was 46. So for 46 years I was a little crazy. I was looking for an adult to put his arms around me and say ... 'You're a grown-up; you can start acting differently now.' "

Burt Reynolds had made a great name for himself. Without the love and support of his father and his friends, however, he could sustain neither his status nor his health. "When I fell from my pedestal nobody remembered me," he confessed. "No one called me with offers of work. No one stopped by to see me." He had made a name for himself which attracted all kinds of people into his life. When his name became tarnished, however, the human family on which he so much depended fractured all around him.

Making a name for ourselves can be done in this world. But it comes with a great price. When we make a name for ourself we inevitably get cut off from the very community of people that sustain our life in the first place."