Today after recording Dinosaur Train,  I went to Spinnaker Sound in White Rock to do a commercial for Panago Pizza. Had a lovely time trying absurd things with the text, at the end of which, actor Brendan Beiser arrived to do his bit and tag lines. We had a brief laugh and then I grabbed my purse and keys off the scoochie leather couch and fled back to Vancouver for a 2pm session of "Rated A for Awesome." 

By the time I got there I had all of nine minutes for lunch. I went into the Bean Around the World  on Cordova and ordered an espresso. They always have the horoscope taped to the cash register in there. So I read mine. I paraphrase: "Expect the unexpected. Communications breakdowns at work. Computer crashes, glitches, faux pas." 

I had a little chuckle. I'd had a great day. I looked at the picture of Georgia Nicholls, astrologer, and thought to myself: WRONG!  

Then I sat down with my coffee and had a look at my iPhone. Message from agent Ralph: Brendan Beiser was still in White Rock. He was missing his keys. Wondered if I might have taken them. I open my purse. It's dizzying. It's really a whole other dimesion in there.  But there were keys on top. Not my own. 

AAAA!

I had 2 minutes to be at work. I had unconsciously purloined Beiser's keys. 

Oh. My. Sleepy. God.

I fly into Dick and Roger's Sound Studios and Roger, my old bean, my favourite pair of eyebrows, my support hose, offers to help, using his courier company. But the courier can't get there as immediately .  It turns out Colin Murdoch, fellow actor, is going to White Rock after his session( 20 mins) to see his old mum.  

What is the ettiquette for stranding an actor four hours in White Rock? My mind went doo-lally.

I had a pen hovering over a check. Brian Drummond, fellow actor, said: "Is that a check? Tabitha. That's just creepy." So I wrote a note and took all the actual money out of my wallet to send with Colin. He wouldn't take it. All my fellow actors went: "Tabitha! That's creepy!" 

So, for his inconvenience,  Beiser ended up with a bag of chocolate chip cookies, which I happened to have. Unless Colin deeked and took them to him mum.


Later:  talked to Beiser, finally. He told me what he felt about the whole thing and let it go. Then he told me what a good actor he thought I was! Wow! A nicer guy to strand for four hours, you couldn't find.

 ...and, why I love my agent

My agent is a gentle giant, name of Ralph. Although he ferries his little family of actors toward their various dramas like emergency crews come to remedy any blandness, he himself is drama-adjacent. You can’t make him mad. You can’t get under his skin, you can’t make him blow a vein. I believe the word is ‘unflappable.’(which is a very funny word. Think of all the poor flappable people flailing about). Not that I would try to rile Ralph. But in the business of entertainment, that level head of his, is gold.

Which is why it’s weird that last week he and I were sitting in his office together bawling our eyes out.

Thing was, late last month Ralph announced he was going to Japan to attend  his partner's nephew’s wedding. I asked him if he would take a donation and see if he could find someone affected by the quake that he could help directly. He ‘d been thinking the same thing.

I had to laugh while he described his encounter with the Japanese nation. “Everything works! Everything’s on time!”  Ralph is very organized. Japan was a Ralphy heaven. He took many pictures. Even of the washrooms with their little slipper sets. 

The wedding was at a Shinto Shrine near a beautiful beach. The bride’s Kimono apparently cost 250, 000 yen(@3000 dollars)for a three hour rental. After the ceremony she wisely got into a frock she could frolic in on the beach.

Like most hotels, one where Ralph and his partner stayed had extra rooms and allocated a percentage to refugees from Fukushima. There was a young couple there in one such room. All their worldly possessions in a van. It seemed like a perfect opportunity. But then Ralph’s nephew? cautioned that in Japan, custom had it that if you offered a gift the recipient was not only obliged to match it, but had to top it. That was a baffler.

He considered leaving the money anonymously in the van, but was told no, it would just embarrass the couple. Nothing else presented itself as a venue so when he and his partner, Daryl returned to Tokyo, the gift money was burning a hole in is pocket.

They were on their way to a mall type place to buy last minute gifts for friends when they passed a man soliciting funds for both people and orphaned domestic animals in Sendai.  Perhaps it was the proscription against giving, but people passed him by without much notice. Ralph alerted his partner. That’s our man.

He took out the envelope containing the yen he had converted and crossed to the animal rescuer. The man glanced in the yawning envelope and here… as Ralph was relating the story, is where he started to tear up. The man took his hand, and held it. He didn’t speak English, clearly, few people there do. And in a place where people are so conscious of one another’s personal space, it was unusual for someone to hold on like that, but Ralph said he could just feel this tremendous wave of…

And here, back in the ofice we both shed tears, tears, tears… I could feel it as Ralph was telling me. So we just hung out and had a weep. The boat rocked. His office is on a boat.

It wasn’t even that much money. There was no language. It was communication by feeling. After the transfer, Ralph and Daryl went to a mall, which was just odd because both were reeling from the power and the beauty of this seemingly minor connection. They got in an elevator. Ralph who is taller than Daryl, noticed him, stock still, staring at the floor. Then Daryl said: “Don’t say anything.”

Ralph went into a shop alone. He bought the trifle he’d been planning to buy. It may have been a pair of underpants. However small, a saleslady took it away to wrap it beautifully and carefully, leaving him alone with a pretty cup of tea, while she did so. He wept. And sipped his tea.

That animal rescuer, true to Japanese tradition as we now understand it, gave back far more than he was given.

People, eh. You gotta love ‘em.