That's me on the silver screen

If you haven't had the experience of sitting in a dark theater watching yourself on the big screen, I recommend you corral a group of friends, shoot a little movie, and submit it to a local film festival. You'll learn things about yourself you'd have no way of imagining otherwise.You'll start to look at filmmaking differently, and you will begin vacuuming your floors more frequently. The color orange will be banished from your wardrobe. Your life will be enriched.

Of course, I'm talking to the figurative you, meaning myself. Last weekend, I worked with a group of theatre people who gathered to write a screenplay in a genre (sci-fi) given to us randomly, with a prop (cheesy ceramic angel) and a line of dialogue ("It's not like they're going to arrest you") which we had to include in our six-minute film, to be written in no more than 12 hours, then filmed, edited, and submitted in the next 36. Our writing session took place at the home of an accomplished composer who worked away on the original soundtrack while the rest of us tossed ideas around like a green salad, in laughter and despair until 3:00am when we agreed that we could go on no longer.

The next morning, the filming began. In my first scene (shot out of order!), I played an aging hippie, dead and gone to heaven, reveling in the presence of Mama God who wanted nothing more from me than to pass a tray of brownies her way from time to time. My other scene was shot in my very own living room, abounding with books, dust, clutter, and dog hair, where I played the still-living aging hippie extolling the properties of a cup of tea I shared with my likewise aging hippie boyfriend. After taking a sip of tea, I vanished, heaven-bound.

Sound like fun? It was--unbelievably so. All week I had a secret that I mentioned to very few people: I was in a movie! I figured my co-workers would stare at me blankly, my boss would think of a reason to condemn my extracurricular activity, and my class of two-and-three-year-olds would respond by telling me about their favorite Disney offerings. Another reason I kept it under wraps was because I wasn't sure about the outcome, meaning how I looked and sounded.

Showtime today was at 4:30 at a locally-operated movie house, where our darling little gem of a film was screened with twelve other little gems. We did not advance to the Best Of category, so my group will be largely absent from tomorrow's Best Of screening, but this matters little in the overall scheme of life. What matters is that I watched myself onscreen and didn't melt into my cushioned seat. It's easy to be critical of oneself--probably unavoidable, if truth be told--when the viewing is bigger than life, particularly if one is oneself on the bigger than life side of physicality. Upon first seeing myself up there, my thoughts ran around like a madman--"Why didn't anybody tell me my nose is huge before? What was I thinking wearing pastel orange? When was the last time I swept Mandy's shedding fur under the couch?" But by the time the six minutes were over, I wanted to start it all over again. The camaraderie, the spontaneity, the outpouring of hilarious but workable ideas is an experience I will cherish until I'm too old to remember it. I'm not vain. I know the limits of my talent. But I had a blast-o-rama, and I suggest you try it too.