Thhppt!

In my lifetime so far, I have won a writing contest (in 7th grade), played a musical instrument, graduated college, married my favorite person in the world, taught middle school students for two years, moved from a town of 1,000 people to a town of 40,000 people to a city of three million people, written on a blog for one-and-a-half years, acted on stage, and also acted in a short film.

But despite all of these accomplishments, there is something I have never been able to do.

I have never been able to blow a raspberry. You know, that noise you make when you put your tongue between your lips and blow? Nope, I can’t do it. No matter how hard I try, I cannot blow one.

This is truly embarrassing. I’ve seen two-month old babies blow raspberries, and I can’t do it. When I try, all that comes out is this pathetic little “thuh” sound. It is quite sad.

Iwanski has even tried to teach me how to do it, but alas, I cannot be taught.

I guess there are just some things that I am not meant to learn.

Like how to pronounce words in German. My good friend Buck, who at one point was giving me voice lessons, tried to teach me one night how to pronounce/sing words in German. He tried for several hours, but I just couldn’t seem to remember the right sounds for the various letters.

It was actually surprising that it was so difficult for me. After all, I had taken a foreign language class (Spanish) in high school, and learning how to speak Spanish seemed to come pretty easy for me. And after all, my family is pretty much 100% German (there may be a little bit of French in there, but we’re not really sure), so I would think that speaking German would be in my blood. But alas, it is not. I am a dufus at speaking German. Der Dufenstein.

I remember several years ago, when I had my very first audition at the acting school where I had been taking classes.

They handed me the script a couple days ahead of time, and I began looking it over.

And there, in the script, I saw that my character not only had to speak German, but also had to blow a raspberry!

I was horrified.

I called my friend Buck in a panic, asking him to help me pronounce the German words, and then I sat home trying to speak German and blow raspberries for several hours.

Finally, the moment had arrived. I actually thought I did pretty well at speaking the words…but then it came to the raspberry. I stuck my tongue between my teeth and began blowing.

“Thuh.”

That was it. I think I ended up blowing more spit at my fellow actor than actually making any sound. I felt my face grow red with embarrassment, and I stumbled over my remaining lines.

Needless to say, I didn’t get the part.

And honestly, I was relieved.

I really didn’t want to call attention to the fact that I, a twenty-nine-year-old woman, couldn’t blow a raspberry.