Need...More...Turkey

Zombie Jason...needs more turkey. With stuffing. And graaaaaavy. Only Ramen at home. Turkey-flavored noodles...not same thing.

I had an eventful week. Last Tuesday, I went to a meeting of a sketch comedy group that arose from the primordial comedic ooze a few weeks ago. I am usually uncomfortable around new people, so I was forcing myself to chat and ask questions. Everyone was friendly. A good time was being had.

So it's near the end of the meeting. They had a show this upcoming Sunday and were doing group readings of the scripts so the director could cast the show. The last script had eight people in it, and everyone was tired of reading, so I thought: "I'll help out with the reading. I have a severe stutter, so it's not like the director is actually going to cast me."

I picked a small part, read it. On the second go around, I picked another small part no one wanted to read.

The next thing I know, the director says to me, "Okay, you're Swami. Meeting adjourned. Everyone, see you this Saturday at rehearsal."

What the f---? Hey, crazy director. I don't like performing. During periods, like the past few weeks, when my stuttering is very severe, I don't even like speaking. I hide under the covers when the phone rings and let my roommates answer it. Read my alpha waves: cast someone else. Like a monkey. Monkeys are funny. Everyone loves monkeys. Monkey monkey monkey monkey....

Alas, as it has been the fate so many times in my life, there was no monkey to be found.

I'll compress the rest of the week. In short, having to perform turns out to be very good motivation to work on one's speech. Confronting some of the avoidances I let develop in the past few months helped my feel better than I have in a long time.

The performance was yesterday, and it went very well. I made stuttering part of my character and made it part of the joke. We filmed the performance and ran it twice, asking the kindly audience to be a laugh track if they had to.

I got almost no laughs the first time around because, to both my pleasure and disappointment, few people laughed at my stuttering. After the first show, we introduced ourselves and I said I'm a real-life person who stutters. I think that made it okay for people to laugh because I got a much better response the second time around.

Overall, it was worth the stress and I'm happy that I got drafted into doing it. I might even do it again, if I can come up with a character who stutters.

Of course, this is assuming the circus still won't loan me the monkey.