TIE me kangaroo down

T wo years ago I was doing Theatre in Education for a poetry based company in Sydney. Theatre in Education is the practice of hiring young, just out of college actors, and sending them out to the wilds of local (and not so local) high schools to deal with two hundred or so screaming children, while the teachers sit behind the gymnasium and share a furtive cigarette.

Drama teachers get to smoke in front of the kids, but only at after show parties.

If an actor becomes famous enough that doing Theatre in Education isn't an option - which hasn't yet happened to me - they generally put their hand into roleplaying. Not rolling dice and pretending to slay dragons, but Medical roleplaying. This involves telling a Doctor who's moved from Africa (where they don't get paid very well) to a western country (where they still don't but at least everyone thinks they do). It also involves a lot of African doctors diagnosing a lot of actors pretending to be workmen who have fallen off ladders with Malaria.

This particular afternoon I was performing at a prestigious boys school on Sydney's North Shore, with a reputation for homoerotic practices amongst the students. This was based off an actual event, years ago, and probably doesn't reflect on the current student body. However, they persist in wearing kilts, so people are naturally given to draw the wrong conclusions.

Some time before this, my mother had been in an advertisement for Balance, Water for Women, and on top of her fee she received eight crates of water bottles. While Water for Women is absolute bullshit (there were natural flower essences and herbs in it, which were tasteless but helped with your feeling of femininity or something or other), they did come in very convenient skinny one litre bottles. So I of course had one on me while I was performing that day.

At the end of the show, we three actors grab seats and ask the students if they have any questions. I of course was asked: "What are you drinking?"

"I'm drinking," said I, "Balance, Water for Women." There is a moments pause while the children assimilate this information. The child from hell raises his hand once again.

"Are you gay?" Everyone snickers.

I take a draught of the water in question. Everyone kind of laughs again.

"I'm not as a matter of fact," say I, quite calmly, "But even if I were, it wouldn't be appropriate for us to go out. Sorry."

The child from hell goggles at me. All the other kids laugh at him, sensing weakness, and wanting a victim who's unable to fight back. The teacher finishes his cigarette, and me and my fellow actors get paid.

Take that, childhood.