You're Only Human (Second Wind)

Today I had an audition for a pilot for HBO.

It didn’t go exactly as planned.

I walk in to the audition feeling very confident. I had read over all of my notes that were in my acting for film and television class.

None of this could have prepared me for how clumsy I am in real life.

Right off the bat I was caught of guard. I had entered the studio and nobody was there to sign me in and no directions were left for me. There were also no other girls auditioning. All I could see was a contact sheet and a bunch of waters. I signed myself in and grabbed a water bottle.

As soon as I had gotten comfortable, a very soft spoken woman came out asking for me. It comes as no surprise to anybody who has ever talked to me while intoxicated that I don’t trust soft spoken people, especially those that are in charge.

I went into the room and introduced myself. As I put down my bag and water on a slanted chair however, the water proceeded to roll off the chair, onto the ground and spill.

I saved it from spilling more than a few drops, but as I was saving it my bag decided to fall over and out came my keys, sunglasses and wallet. I spent the first three minutes (and boy was it a long 3 minutes) in the room putting things like they should be and feeling like an idiot while soft-spoken lady just looked at me. I could feel my traitor face getting red with embarrassment; thank god for make up.

Finally I got in front of the camera and I did a good reading. Soft Spoken lady didn’t seem that put off by my former clumsiness, but, then again, when you’re voice is barely a whisper I doubt you ever seem all that annoyed.

While the audition didn’t end up going all that badly, even if their first impression of me was that I had the grace of an ogre, I was still slightly beating myself up about it as I waited for the subway.

That was precisely when Billy Joel appeared to me in the form of a creepy middle aged foreign dude.

The man walked up to me and said, in an accent I only wish I could imitate, “Oh miss! You should not worry so much; I know it’ll work out well for you!” To which I relplied, “oh, Thanks.” I would have liked to have reassured the guy with smile, but I watched enough after school specials to know you don’t smile at a stranger or else he might become your stalker.

I tried to avoid the guy by getting on the car ahead of us on the platform. He still followed me though and didn’t say anything until the next stop. Right before he got off, without bothering to tell me his name or his number like so many creeps have before him, or worse, asking me for those deets, he simply said, “No crying anymore!”

Before I could point out to him that I hadn’t been crying, he handed me a still wrapped single Halls cough drop and flashed me a smile.

I laughed with the girl sitting next to me on the train, who seemed to think the whole exchange quite amusing. At the time I chalked it up to yet another character met through New York City’s public transportation, but later that night when a sudden cough came on me, I couldn’t help but to be thankful that I had my halls cough drop. I realized that since the run in with the man I had thought less about my clumsiness and more about how well the reading went, and, truth be told, mostly about what a strange person I had met in the subway.

I may not have been on the brink of suicide about to jump from one of New York’s bridges, but I like to think that Billy had decided to appear to me as he did to that dude in the “You’re Only Human (Second Wind)” music video. Just as Billy appeared to the man as a harmonica playing homeless dude/angel and put things in perspective, maybe he appeared to me as a foreign dude/angel with some Halls.

Or maybe creepers are just getting friendlier and worse at stalking.

Either way, I’m holding on for that second wind to come along.