It was bound to happen sometime. A celebrity has arrived in my neighborhood. Earlier this week, I was sipping a mango smoothie in my perfect take-some-work-and-get out-of-the-house spot: the adorable new sandwich and smoothie place on Henry Street. The shop was neither empty nor crowded, and it had that pleasurable hum of just enough conversation and just enough “Abbey Road” to make you feel unisolated yet undisturbed. “Eve,” someone called out, disturbing me from my work. Couldn’t whomever it was see that I was typing on a laptop, the universal cafe sign for do not disturb? I looked up from the screen to find Mallory, friend of a friend. “Hi, there,” I said, smiling. Friends of friends are the ideal interrupters – you know you’re only in for a quick hi-how-are-you rather than any sort of full catch-up conversation. This would be more of a pause for station identification as opposed to a full-on commercial break. “Just wanted to say a quick hi,” she said, still standing. “My dog’s outside, and I see you’re working …” “No, no,” I said, shooing at my laptop, as if the computer itself were piffle. “I’m glad you did. How are things?” “Great,” she said. Taking a sip of iced coffee, she began to tell me about a benefit concert for which she was doing publicity. “It’s got a great lineup: Paul Simon will be performing and …” her voice trailed off as her gaze, seemingly involuntarily, shifted towards the window.

I found myself following suit, craning my neck for a better view. Was something going on with her dog?

But I soon realized the action was not out the window, but in the window seat. A slim woman had arrived with a newsboy-capped man and slipped into the table. Her dark hair was pulled up into a messy ponytail/bun similar to the one I myself was wearing. I instantly recognized her as the lead actress in a popular HBO series.

When I lived on the Upper West Side, not a week would pass without a celebrity sighting. I’d even gotten into traffic patterns with some of them. For a few weeks, an Academy Award-winning actress and I seemed to pick the same times to shop at Fairway. And during the first six months after his show ended, Jerry Seinfeld and I would “meet” on the corner of 75th and Columbus so often – I, on the way to Pilates class, he, judging from attire and Page Six, on the way to the Reebok gym – we took to nodding at each other in acknowledgment.

But this was Brooklyn. And not hipster Brooklyn. Instead of Central Park, there were Italian social clubs down the street. I took two-second stock of the actress’s outfit: white tank top under a peach silk dress, heather-gray yoga capris and white scarf belt tied low at the hip. Shoes: barely worn-in flip-flops. Plus, the guy with her wore a newsboy cap, army pant cutoffs and Nehru collar. Pretty L.A., if you ask me. I turned back to face Mallory and she followed suit, blinking back to our conversation. “I’m sorry, what was I saying?” “You were telling me about the benefit.” It seemed the unwritten New York code of nonchalance in the face of celebrity sightings should also apply in Brooklyn. “Yes, that’s right,” she said, then widened her eyes, as if to say “Did you see who that is?” I widened mine back, to say, “Yes, I know.” I said, “Sounds like a great event,” to mask it. With a big pink elephant now in the room and nothing much else to say to each other, Mallory and I wrapped it up with a round of “Great to see yous.” She made for the door, slowing down ever so slightly as she passed the celebrity’s table. Of course, the celebrity noticed – they have finely tuned radar for these things – and she looked up, first at Mallory, then at me. I gave her a little closed-mouth smile, then turned back to my laptop. But I found I couldn’t focus on my work, not with the celebrity sitting there, eating – what was that … A breakfast burrito? – and scanning the morning papers. What was this actress doing here? Would she be the first of many? What were the ramifications of an HBO actress sitting in my neighborhood sandwich place? The ironic thing was, this was exactly the kind of low-key but stylish type of place her TV character would eat in. Despite the fact that I rarely watched her show – I thought it precious and a bit overrated – I realized then and there how completely my little slice of Brooklyn fit into the HBO demographic. Buzzing from the celebrity energy, I got up from my table and went outside for a break. I felt the actress’s eyes as I passed her, but didn’t so much as glance her way. Once on the sidewalk, I called Hallie on my cell phone. “You’ll never guess who’s at the smoothie place,” I said. “Wait,” she said. “Is it a celebrity?” When I said, “yes,” she said the name. Or actually, she said the name of her character, and the shorter version of the actress’s last name. But this seemed somehow more correct. “Yes!” I said. When I asked how she knew, she said another friend had recently seen her at brunch on Smith Street. “Do you think she lives here?” I said. “In this neighborhood?” “This is Brooklyn,” she said. “No one comes here unless they live here.”