Sleepwalk With Me

by Mike Birbiglia

  The reason this wide variety of talented people is assembled in one place is that college activity booking is a pretty lucrative industry. Because the number of drinking-related deaths has skyrocketed in recent years, college administrations have no choice but to book as many non-drinking-related activities as possible. Drinking really is an issue. When I performed in the multipurpose center at Penn State, they were celebrating a made-up holiday called “State Patty’s Day.” Apparently Saint Patrick’s Day usually falls during spring break, and the students at Penn State felt totally ripped off by this gross calendar injustice. So, not wanting to miss out on a holiday dedicated to binge drinking, they invented another one. Penn State students are nothing if not inventive (and drunk).

  However, one year St. Patrick’s Day didn’t fall during their spring break, so when I arrived on campus to perform, they were celebrating both State Patty’s Day and Saint Paddy’s Day. I knew this fake holiday should be red-flagged when I picked up the college newspaper and read the headline “Victim Takes Partial Blame.” I thought, Are the Penn State headline writers also drinking? Because that headline seems like it was written by someone who had just knocked down several mojitos.

  Intrigued by the slurred headline, I continued. The story covered a widely discussed event on campus in which a drunk driver hit a drunk walker. I thought, Hey, maybe these people shouldn’t be making up holidays to drink more. Maybe if they drank less they might be able to title their newspaper articles more specifically. For example, I would title this last article “Drunk Driver Hits Drunk Walker Drunkety-Drunk I’m So Drunk.”

  With all this drunkenness, these colleges needed to book mentalists, lecturers, and, sometimes, me.

  I’ve performed at Maryland, Merrimack, Marymount, Marietta, William & Mary, Mary Washington, George Washington, and Georgetown.

  I’ve played the Big East, the Pac-10, and the PacWest.

  I’ve played Washington, Western Washington, and Eastern Washington.

  I’ve played orientations, homecomings, Halloweens, senior balls, frat parties, student centers, common rooms, cafeterias, chapels, hockey rinks, basketball arenas, and the Sun Dome.

  I’ve played UC Berkeley, UC Riverside, UCLA, SUNY Cobleskill, SUNY Binghamton, and SUNY Albany.

  Let’s see . . . Chapman, Curry, Bowdoin, Bates, Bentley, Bradley, Babson . . .

  Of course there was Middle Tennessee State. And yes, I said Middle. And they do get offended if you mix them up with Tennessee State. Trust me.

  And then there’s Wisconsin. Ah, Wisconsin. I played UW–Stevens Point, UW–Whitewater, UW–Marinette, UW–Superior, UW–River Falls, UW–Stout, UW–Eau Claire. I played Carthage. All of these schools fed me cheese.

  I played Anchorage and Fairbanks. I saw the aurora borealis and swam in the naturally occurring hot springs. That was nice.

  I played DePaul, DePauw, Defiance, and Delaware . . .

  I did Penn College, Penn State, UPenn, Penn State Behrend, and Alvernia College, which is in Pennsylvania but doesn’t have a catchy name.

  I’ve played St. Rose, St. Mary’s, College of the Assumption, Salve Regina, Notre Dame . . .

  I played Michigan, Michigan State, Central Michigan, Northern Michigan.

  I did shows at West Virginia Tech, Texas Tech, Illinois Tech.

  I did BU, CU, NYU.

  I played Johnson & Wales (twice) where some people major in “pastry.” The food in the cafeteria was terrible.

  I did shows at Harvard, Princeton, Yale, and Columbia.

  Middlebury, Monmouth, Rider, Ripon, Case Western, Northwestern, and Norwich University, which is a private military college in Vermont.

  These are just a few.

  Colleges tend to be an uphill battle for the performer. I have often been placed, for example, in the lunchroom, during lunch. These shows are called “nooners.” One time I did a nooner at Rhode Island College and it got reviewed in the school paper. AJ Paglia wrote, “There were enough stand-up comedian mistakes of that day to fill the Grand Canyon, and if he said, ‘No one’s laughing’ one more time, he would have won a free toaster. At one point, he began telling a bit about cell phones, and then paused, ineptly looked at the crowd, and then began a different bit. He forgot his joke!”

  Looking back, I can’t remember much about this show, but I believe AJ, especially that confusing analogy about the Grand Canyon. My depth of failure at that show was as deep as a tourist attraction that advertises deepness. I didn’t even realize I was in contention for a toaster, but had I known, I would have pulled out my toaster-centric material. And if I had really wanted a toaster, I could have just stolen one. I was in the cafeteria. And frankly, I don’t see what’s wrong with repeatedly saying, “No one’s laughing.” It’s simply my way of pointing out where people might laugh if they think what I’ve said is funny. I was being helpful. Besides, without the “No one’s laughing” repetition, my set would have really been too short. And no one, with the exception of AJ Paglia, would have wanted that.

  AJ’s article concluded by saying that “Birbiglia had a very weak, pitiful character to him,” which I feel crosses a certain line of meanness. To criticize my signature Grand Canyon–style of comedy is one thing, but my character? That feels personal. And I definitely felt hurt when this came to me via Google alert at two-thirty in the morning. I do have a pitiful character, I thought, and Why am I awake?

  Sometimes colleges booked me in their finest venue on campus and that would be problematic as well, but for different reasons. Then it would be an issue because the students were sometimes disappointed to learn I was their main event for the semester. I was once asked to perform at Yale University in the prestigious Woolsey Hall. Unfortunately, the previous year they’d had Lewis Black, which means that my show probably signaled some kind of budget cut. A Google alert directed me to a Yale Daily News article:

  Stand-up comedian Mike Birbiglia will perform at this year’s Fall Show. Students had mixed reactions to the news of this year’s performer, as many students said they were not familiar with Birbiglia.

  At first I thought, thanks Yale Daily News! As though my self-esteem isn’t low enough, you’ve invited me to your school and now there’s an article dedicated to the fact that you’ve never heard of me. It’s like asking a girl to the prom and then, when she says yes, saying to her, “You see, last year my date was way hotter than you, but she graduated, and so I figured, why the hell don’t I ask you? Perhaps I’ve never heard of you, but that shouldn’t matter, right?”

  I thought, surely there must be someone who’s heard of me. Otherwise why would they have invited me? Then I read, “Dan Nagler, class of 2008, said he has never heard of the comedian and is unsure whether he will attend the show. ‘[I’m] not disappointed necessarily,’ he said. ‘Just because I don’t know him doesn’t mean he’s not awesome.’”

  Phew, I thought. Dan may not be attending the show but at least he’s not ruling out the possibility of me being awesome. Of course, it’s hard to be awesome when no one attends your show, so there’s kind of a catch-22 there. As I read further, there was a ray of hope: “Though he had never heard of Birbiglia, Austin Shiner, ’11, said he will likely attend. But a higher-profile comedian would make for a more exciting event. ‘I suppose at the end of the day, I think Robin Williams when he’s on his game is just about unbeatable,’ Shiner said. ‘If they had found a way to get Robin Williams to come, it would have been unbelievable.’” Finally, I thought, a voice of reason. Austin Shiner has this Bill and Ted–style idea about taking a time machine back to 1979 and booking Robin Williams in his prime. While we’re at it, why don’t we have Jimi Hendrix open the show and just play the hits? Now that we’re brainstorming, is FDR available to speak at graduation? The article ends with a quote from Maddy Blount, ’08, saying she did not know of Birbiglia but is glad that “the Fall Show will actually take place during the fall this year.” Glad to be of some help, Maddy. If there’s one thing Mike Birbiglia knows, it’s when fall i
s. September, October, November, right? Nice.

  When I received this Google alert at 1:41 a.m., I sent a letter to the Yale Daily News. I wrote, “I’m still planning to come to your school and I’m going to put on the best show I can. A great man once said, ‘Just because you don’t know who I am doesn’t mean I’m not awesome.’ I’m trying to stay positive. After all, my first choice was to perform at Harvard. You were my safety school.”

  One day Jill called and asked if I was willing to perform at five colleges in four days in Oregon and Washington State. It was short notice because one of her other comedians had to cancel. Perfect. I wasn’t the colleges’ first choice. But given the choice of me or no show at all, I had triumphed over nothing.

  “Five in four days is a lot, right?”

  “Two of them are nooners.”

  “Right.”

  “It shouldn’t be a big deal. Jump on a plane. Knock out some shows. Fly home.”

  This is the kind of language people use when they want you to forget about the extreme strain you’re about to put on your body. “Jump on a plane.” “Knock out” some shows. No mention of the “drive your ass off eleven hundred miles until you’re almost asleep at the wheel” or “cram yourself into a seat with no leg room and endure six and a half hours next to a one-and-a-half-sized person who smells likes olives to a gig no one really wants you at.” I looked at my bank account that was in parentheses and said, “Sure.”

  A few days later I wake up at 4:30 a.m. to jump on a plane, which is that part of the morning before the earth even exists. Before they’ve even programmed the Matrix. You walk out of your apartment and the road isn’t even there. You walk out of your house, and there’s just a guy with a laptop who yells, “We need a road, stat!” “How ’bout a building, Tank!”

  I get a cab to the Newark airport. And I get my ticket. I hand it to the security lady. And she looks at my ticket and she says, “Well, this gate is completely wrong.” I guess they changed the gate. The way she says it is like I was involved in the gate selection process. Like I didn’t like the gate that was printed on my ticket, so I photoshopped my favorite gate onto the ticket and printed it myself. Like I took one look and said, “B twenty-two, I don’t think so.” No, I was not involved in the process. I was not even cc’d. So she says, “You need to take a tram to another terminal, and I suggest you run.”

  So I run.

  There’s nothing worse than being late for a flight because you’re running with your roller suitcase and roller suitcases do not enjoy running.

  They’re like, “I don’t want to run! I have wheels!”

  And you’re like, “Listen, roller suitcase, I’m not good at running either, but I tell you what, when we get to the hotel, I’ll walk you in circles for a few hours.”

  I get to the tram area. Fortunately, they have a nice little thing where a sign says how many minutes until the next tram arrives. The sign says, “0 minutes.” For a moment, I’m excited. I think, Zero minutes! That’s exactly how long I want to wait. But there’s no tram. It already drove away. Then the sign changes to “10 minutes.”

  I eventually reach the gate. And I’m sitting at the gate, and I fall asleep. I wake up to the sound of the gate door closing.

  I jump out of my chair, but there’s no one around.

  They’ve closed the door, but I’m not on the fun side, with the airplanes and the pilot. On my side, it’s just me and the Cinnabon lady, and the Cinnabon lady is not very well connected in the airline community. I ask, “Do you know the people who can open the door?”

  And she says, “I just know the white stuff goes on the Cinnabon.”

  So here I am, I’m on the sad side of the door. I’m on the side with me and the Cinnabon lady, which normally I’d be very excited about. I’m a big fan of pastries the size of a baby that contain enough calories for a year. That seems like an effective use of time.

  At that point I walk over and I start banging on the large window like in a romantic comedy. I think of yelling, “Stop the plane, Drew Barrymore’s character!”

  I do not make that flight.

  So I’m on standby for the 10:00 a.m., which gets me into Seattle by 4:00 p.m., and I drive two and a half hours upstate to Bellingham, to Whatcom Community College, which is 106 miles. (Or according to Mapquest, up to two hours and thirty minutes in traffic. Bingo, Mapquest!) By the time I arrive, it’s almost 7:00. The show starts at 7:30. I walk onto a recently built stage in the student center and pretend I’m not tired for about an hour. It’s a very small crowd. Crowd? Well, about thirty people. At community colleges, since most students commute, they often bring comedians to try to bring people together. That night, they stayed apart. I was no help.

  The next day I’m supposed to do the nooner, but I’m technically booked for 11:00 a.m., and it’s about two hours away in Tacoma, so I think it’s wiser to drive there that night. I start driving at 10:00 p.m., though it feels about 5:00 a.m. in terms of my emotional stability. I have no energy, but I think about the six months of rent this trip will take care of. All I have to do is live through it, I think.

  The nooner is worse than I could have imagined. I have actually been booked to perform during a study hall. I’m performing. They’re studying. Who thought of this? I wonder on stage, sometimes aloud, hoping there are no reviewers ready with their notebooks to crucify me with my own self-deprecating words. I don’t know who to feel sorrier for: me or the people trying to study. There are like fifteen people trying to study biology and I’m in their face shouting, “The thing about panda bears is they look like each other!” I try to think up material that might apply to the subjects they are studying. How many mitochondria does it take to power a cell? One. Because mitochondria are the powerhouse of the cell. Not ready for prime time, that one. Afterward, I go to a local restaurant and drown my sorrows in an ice cream pie shaped like a baked potato. I know it’s not healthy, but at least it’s shaped like a vegetable.

  I head for school three, Columbia Basin College. They have me hosting a lip-synch contest—which is not a format that I’m a fan of. And neither are the students. There are only two entries, and the director of student activities is furious. When she gets up to introduce me, she says, “In the past we’ve had fifteen or twenty entries and this year there were two. And we don’t have to have this contest if you don’t want to have it, because I’m not doing this for me. I’m doing this for you. And now the comedian, Mike Birbiglia!” And then I jog onstage and say, “Y’all ready to lip-synch? I can’t hear you!” That was my lip-synch joke.

  I’m driving to school four. At this point, I’m driving through the night through the Cascade Mountains to get to another nooner the next day and one final show the next night. About halfway through the mountains my gas tank is on empty and so I do what any logical person would.

  I drive faster. That way I can avoid the suspense of running out of gas and just cut to that desperate standing-on-the-side-of-the-road thing.

  It’s late at night and there are very few streetlights. The road is windy and I’ve been on my phone talking to my sister Patti. So now that I might actually need my phone, it’s dead. At this point I’m thinking only the darkest of thoughts. I will be stranded in the mountains. It’s freezing. I’ll die. At the very least, I won’t get to the nooner that’s going to pay my rent for April.

  So I’m driving like a hundred miles an hour over a mountain and I’m making all these resolutions with myself, like, If I get to a gas station, I am going to donate all of my clothing to the tsunami fund and I’m going to eat only vegetables. Eventually I get to a gas station and I think, Forget that plan. I’d like a full tank of gas and some Funyuns. It’s amazing how quickly your thoughts can go from I think I’m gonna die to I think I’d like fake onion rings.

  School four is easy. People show up. They eat hot dogs and cotton candy in some kind of carnival-themed student center event that I don’t even bother asking about, but it’s fine. On to school five and then fly ho
me.

  School five is in Walla Walla, Washington. They booked me to perform in the center of the gymnasium during an all-night “Walkathon for Lupus.” When I arrive the young man who booked me looks at me with a straight face and says, “I know it’s not ideal.” And he’s right, because I have to hold a microphone and kind of oscillate like a desk fan that blows jokes. All night these participants walk around the track and sort of glance uncomfortably at me as they pass. It’s like having a steady stream of people steadily walk out of my show, and then return, not miraculously, just a few minutes later on the other side of the track. It’s not ideal. As ideal as it might sound, I can assure you it is not. But I am not going to take the fall for the tepid response I receive at this show. If you’re walking around an indoor track for seven hours to raise money for charity, the last thing you want to see is me in the middle, chasing you with a microphone and yelling about the Teletubbies. The first thing you want to see is a cup of water, maybe some orange slices.

  I have nothing left. I have made my rent. I return to the La Quinta Inn where the students booked me. It’s 1:00 a.m. I’m completely exhausted. But I’m not going to sleep. I have one more thing to do. I have to check my email to see if any more gigs like this have come through. Because when you’re self-employed, email becomes a sort of slot machine.