Quiet on the Set… | Sojourners

Quiet on the Set…

Film stardom is an elusive dream for most, including even yours truly, whom many have credited with talents well-suited for the big screen. My home town is still talking about my performance as the "Voice From Offstage" in our high school production of Pillow Talk. (The words "Delivery, ma’am!" have, if I may say so, never been spoken with so much emotional authority.) So it was not a complete surprise to me recently when I was singled out by a major Hollywood director during the making of a major Hollywood film.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

BEING THE ONLY person in my house who works near a shopping area, I’m often tasked with purchasing various personal products that the other members of my family can’t buy during the day. Almost weekly the women of the house give me a list of products to pick up at the nearby CVS drugstore. Suffice it to say, these are not "manly" items, products that would, in the process of purchasing them, remind one of the innate strength of his masculinity, or convey to other patrons that "here’s a gent to be reckoned with." In fact, I’ll even admit to some embarrassment at approaching the check-out counter with a basket full of said products, at times feeling it necessary to quickly choose other items to balance out the gender deficiencies therein. (The latest copy of Guns ‘n Ammo magazine or a bottle of Old Spice usually does the trick.)

I was on such an errand when I literally stepped into the path of stardom (and, quite frankly, was rather rudely asked to get out of the way).

Inside the drugstore the cashier had thoughtfully jammed my purchases into a single plastic bag which, stretched tightly over the packages, revealed to just about anybody that I had "confidence, both day and night," on account of the "extra absorbency."

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Sojourners Magazine November-December 1998
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