I Wonder What the Goofiest Piece of Clothing I’ve Ever Worn Was?

My last two years of college were fun years. After my initial two years of being a complete and total dork-sans-social-life, I relaxed. I decided that reading only 20 pages of my 22 page homework assignment would not result in immediate death by lightning. I tried out drinking, just a little bit (I was 20 – a real rule breaker.) I stayed up late a few times, went out with friends, learned how to make fun times instead of sitting in my room and expecting them to just happen upon me. And I also got the most acting roles I would ever have at our little college. I felt like a rock star.

One particular acting role was in a play called Beautiful Bodies. This was a play with solid leading roles for 6 women, which is unheard of. Among the characters was the well-dressed, perfectly coiffed hostess of the party . . . the bitchy New Yorker . . . the difficult and controlling lawyer . . . the totally wacky pregnant cyclist. Guess which one I was?

So yeah, I wore some odd outfits on stage for that one. I think my entrance was me in a pregnancy belly with bike shorts, a large sweatshirt, and a helmet, which I kept on my head for a large part of the first act, if I remember correctly. I won’t count stuff I’ve worn onstage for this blog post (if I did, though, I think the time I wore a wedding gown and two prosthetic noses, stuck to my face with a pair of lensless glasses, would perhaps win the contest.)

A pregnant belly really wacks up your center of gravity. It’s hard to be for real pregnant, but it was especially hard to be pretend pregnant and go from 0 months to 9 months overnight, with no chance for my back or tummy or leg or whatever muscles to learn how to handle it. In the week or so leading up to this show, we received my pregnancy-is-uncomfortable prosthesis, borrowed from some sort of teenagers-now-don't-you-have-sex-mmmmkay? type program in the area. This thing was wayyy uncomfy, with some sort of poky thing meant to squeeze your bladder, and some sort of back hurty thing, in addition to the heavy belly (and it in no way even came close to mimicking the true extreme discomfort of being nine months pregnant, but bless them, they tried to be true to life.) So I put it on and was a clumsy dolt, and our costumer decided that I needed to get some more practice in it.

Just wear it around campus this week, she said.

Wha-? I said.

Wear it. To class and stuff.

Uhhh, then people will be confused.

Yeah. Awesome, huh?

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So I wore it. The young male students suddenly fell over themselves to give up their chairs for me, give me rides, open doors. Several teachers looked at me with extreme puzzlement, which they then swallowed and turned into sweet concern. I got a lot of "How you doin', hon" from the female professors. I felt a little bit like a fraud, but isn't that what acting is, after all?

To be totally honest here, I TOTALLY loved the attention. I was glad she asked me. It was super fun. But the best part? Was taking the dang thing off at the end of the day. Man, I wish I could've done that when it happened for real.