In the early 2000s, after many years as a tax accountant and auditor in San Francisco’s financial district with a few CPA firms and now on my own, I ran into an attorney friend on the streets of North Beach outside a cafe on Washington Square. It was a chance encounter — espresso and croissant in hand, and the chill of the fog about to roll in under the Golden Gate.

“I’ve got a client whose friend needs a new tax accountant. His former one retired.” he said. “High net worth individual.”
 “I’m game,” I told him.

He arranged a meeting with the prospective client for a tax interview and to gather documents. That is how I found myself standing in the lobby of the Fontana East condominiums at North Point and Polk—a twelve story tower perched on the Bay. The doorman ushered me into the elevator that rose directly to the 12th floor penthouse. The doors opened—not into a hallway—but into the living room of the penthouse itself.

The view was staggering.

Golden Gate Bridge.
Alcatraz.
The Bay Bridge.
Marin County rolling off into the distance.
Aquatic Park below like a postcard.
The Pacific Ocean shimmering beyond.

It was the kind of panorama that makes you momentarily forget why you came.

A gracious Filipino couple—his staff—welcomed me and guided me into the living room. Sitting on a couch at the edge of the room was Eddie Fisher—the singer who had once been married to America’s sweetheart Debbie Reynolds before leaving her for Elizabeth Taylor after her husband Mike Todd perished in a plane crash — a romantic drama that had once dominated Hollywood headlines.

In the middle of the room stood two grand pianos. On top of them  framed photographs—snapshots of a life lived to the max. I remember particularly the photos of his daughter, Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia of Star Wars fame), smiling beside her mother Debbie Reynolds. Nearby were images of their granddaughter, Billie Lourd.

Hollywood lineage arranged atop polished Steinways.

Here was a man whose résumé read like mid-century America’s entertainment soundtrack:

• Seventeen Top 10 hits between 1950 and 1956.

• Thirty-five songs in the Top 40.

• “Any Time” selling over a million copies in 1953.

• A then-staggering $1 million contract in 1957 to headline at the Tropicana in Las Vegas.

• Eighteen albums.

• Films with Debbie Reynolds and Elizabeth Taylor.

• Appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.

• Five marriages, including to Reynolds, Taylor, and Connie Stevens.

• Four children.

• A life that tabloids fed upon for decades.

Eddie and Liz

Fisher’s good looks and strong, melodic tenor had made him a teen idol—one of the most popular singers of the early 1950s. America once swooned at the sound of his voice.

And there I sat.

Little old me.

An accountant.

Not a producer. Not an agent. Not a publicist.

I was there to discuss royalty streams, quarterly estimates, and the relentless reality of federal and California tax law.

Lifetime royalties flowed in from recordings, movies, television appearances, books –contracts negotiated decades earlier. There were entities, trusts, and revenue streams—proof that talent, when properly managed, can echo financially long after the applause fades.

The proximity to such a legend was undeniably novel. But I wasn’t star-struck. By then I had lived enough life—navigated enough triumphs, betrayals, collapses, and reinventions—that fame no longer dazzled me. I saw him as:

An extraordinarily talented human being with an unbelievable life story who had plenty of war stories of his own to tell.

By then Eddie Fisher had already lived several lives — chart-topping singer, part of Hollywood’s most famous love triangle, and a man who had wrestled publicly with the excesses of that world.

He was a client.

And I was there to do what I do best: bring order to complexity.

It struck me as one of those improbable squares on life’s bingo card. Growing up in Grosse Pointe, I could not have imagined that one day I would be sitting in a San Francisco penthouse with Eddie Fisher discussing his tax situation.

But that’s the strange thing about a lifetime of interesting experiences.

If you stay in the game long enough, the improbable eventually introduces itself, shakes your hand, and asks about its tax liability.