I recently played a small part in a community theatre production of a well known play. After ten weeks of rehearsals and endlessly pacing through my living room reciting my lines I finally figured out what’s wrong with real life. The play came out perfect; my real life hasn’t. Why?
First, there’s no script in real life. We’ve got to make this stuff up as we go. No wonder I’m always in trouble for saying inappropriate things; I’ve been winging it all these years without a script. I’ve been inventing dialog as fast as I can, just to keep up.
Not only are there no scripts, there are no rehearsals either. We get no practice. Everything is happening for the first and final time. That’s why we all look like klutzes; we’re fumbling through life with no practice.
No retakes, the first take is a keeper. Our first and only effort goes into the record books and we never get a chance to craft or hone our actions. We just blurt it out, screw it up and live with it, forever.
We also don’t get a chance to go back and edit our original performances. We all need to tighten, shorten, pep up or correct our first efforts but we never get a chance. Life is difficult enough without recording history on the first take without so much as a microsecond of editing.
Absolutely the worst thing about real life is there is no sound track. Real life is dead quiet. Life really needs an off-camera orchestra to enhance our moods, alert us to coming dangers and to add action to our otherwise boring moments.
My life is one big first draft full of typos, misspellings, fragments, and the lot.
No wonder I’m depressed.
©2009 by Bob Rockwell
Too Much Tequila, Too Little Sunscreen 
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