A fairly famous actor recently booked our beach house on airbnb. I google all our beach house guests for peace of mind. Even though they are paying money, this is our personal vacation house that was not built as a rental. It’s filled with treasures and original art from our travels. I make this very clear to all guests. If at any time I start feeling uncomfortable with renting it, I will pull it.

When I googled this actor’s name, he used his full name, which encompasses his stage name, it sounded familiar to me. Even after googling and determining who it was, I still kind of wasn’t sure if it was really him. It was a fairly last minute booking on a recent and extremely unusual cancellation. Anyway, it ended up being the actual actor who had invited a few friends to the beach house for the weekend. I always check the security camera at the front door on day of arrival to make sure guests arrive and are able to access the house. Sure enough, clear as day, it was him.

I had emailed him the house manual prior to arrival so I had his email address, and he mine. On their second day, he emailed me saying how much he loved the house and how they would take exceptional care of it, and if it was his, he wouldn’t let anyone stay there. Lol, cute.

After he and friends left, I texted the designer to let her know how much he liked the house. She was THRILLED to say the least, and added his quote to an instagram story and tagged the house. I was a little taken aback, but since he was already gone, and the story would quickly disappear, I didn’t fret for too long.

The next day I started noticing a selfie going around of him and a few people at a coffee shop up the highway from the beach house. It made the news! Crazy! So I copied the photo to the beach house Instagram and said how cool it was that he stayed at our house.

The next day he left a sweet review of his stay, which almost everyone does. It’s a cool house. I’m a very responsive host. This is technically a business after all. I screen shot his review and posted it saying what a cool guy he is for taking the time. although there was a small photo, and his first name, you cannot search a person’s Airbnb account.

This is when the nightmare began. Apparently this actor has a whole lot of crazy stalker fans who felt like I had betrayed his trust, and put him in danger. Although I did receive many, many great and sensible, kind comments, the handful of hate generated was too much for me. Even instagram stepped in and sidelined the comments. I honestly could not believe the fallout. He was long gone. Certainly from the house, and probably from the state by that point.

One of my particular “favorite” comments was “classic greedy American making money off other people’s fame and putting a great man in danger.” Really? How did I put HIM in danger. I pulled the instagram post. Not because I did anything wrong, but because the comments were making me physically ill. I feel really really awful that this seemingly very sweet man has so many evil people following him merely for his choice of career. I couldn’t do it.

What is wrong with people. How did we get to be this way.