The sun rose on a Saturday at the University of Dayton. It was two days before Halloween, so you already knew students were going all out and dressing up for the holiday. Inside a house, six girls were preparing for their big debut. Step one: the turtlenecks and black leggings. For this process, it was necessary for the turtleneck to be put on first. Without this staple item on, you were a goner and simply unable to proceed onto the following steps. Once this was on, step two: pinning of the hair, began. Numerous bobby pins were spread about the floors of every bedroom. Hair was being pulled left and right and pinned down as flat as possible to our heads. Then, the commencement of step three, the bald caps. For some reason, our bald caps came in what seemed like an XXL size, so adjustments were promptly made. They were stretched and suctioned to our frail heads, removing every existing piece of hair in sight. Step four, the most important step of them all, the blue paint. We each grabbed tubes full of electric blue face paint and got to work. Blue paint was being squirted from every direction in the house. We lathered it across ever inch of our faces, while simultaneously helping the other person rub it on the back of their bald cap. Six turtlenecks, 70+ bobby pins, six bald caps and eight tubes of blue paint later, our masterpiece was complete.
The first hour of being a member of the Blue Man Group was incredible. We got a whole range of reactions. From shocking stares, to gasping out of fright, we were a hit. Some people couldn’t even tell us apart. Occasionally, some people couldn’t tell who I was. A friend of mine thought I was some random stranger with their face painted blue, just casually starting a conversation with him. Just imagine a situation like that for a second. Now, you can understand where his fear and confusion of me came from.
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From there, I started to hit some ups and downs. Given the unseasonably warm 76-degree October day, wearing a black turtleneck was not the most ideal item of clothing to be rocking. But, I had to remain in character, so there were no alternatives. I just had to suck it up. Then, came the melting of my blue face paint. The more I would sweat, the more blue paint that came off. I found myself and other Blue Men constantly running inside our house to reapply blue paint to our upper lips, chins and foreheads. Like I said before, there were no alternatives!
I had to stay in character. If the Blue Men could sweat their hearts out during one of their paint drumming performances, then I could survive the Ohio heat. After this rough patch, I found myself in the back of a pickup truck. Myself and a few other members of the Blue Man Group were riding around the Ghetto, whilst getting more and as many people as we could to stop and stare at us. Not on purpose, of course.
As the day came to a close, the pizza and laughs didn’t fad, but our blue paint did. To this day, I am still finding blue paint all over our house. Turn on the bathroom sink, there’s a smudge of blue near the faucet. Try to grab a cup from the cabinet, smudge of blue. Try to walk up the stairs, smudge of blue on the railing. Try to put your headphones in your ears, smudge of blue on the ear bud. I swear, I feel like a blue girl that lives in a blue world, and all day and all night everything I see is blue.
Although cleaning up the blue around the house has been a hassle, my takeaway from this experience has been an ample respect for the Blue Man Group. It’s not easy being blue all the time. Also, this experience has made my search history packed full of YouTube videos exclusively of the Blue Man Group and their outrageous and impressive performances.
One day, I hope I’ll get to see them live because what they’ve been doing for the past 25 years is truly mesmerizing and brilliant. Unfortunately, my bank account can’t supply the $65 needed for a ticket to their show. So, for now, I’ll stick to YouTube videos and covering my own face in blue paint.
