Me, a brown paper bag and kindness.

 On Thursday, right at the beginning of teaching my class, I got violently sick.

Not much warning. No graceful fade-out. Just that hot, dizzy wave that tells you your body has other plans. I excused myself to throw up in the bathroom and returned feeling a little better. I managed to power through the three hour class because sometimes adrenaline is stronger than nausea. But once I left and made it to Penn Station, my body clocked out.

I was vomiting into a brown paper bag I had to buy from Walgreens. There is something particularly humbling about paying for the bag you know you’re about to throw up in. I had tucked myself into a hallway that was very quiet but a few people were still walking by. 

We all know vomiting is awful. Doing it in public feels like a total stripping of dignity. You become hyper-aware of your body, your vulnerability, the way people avert their eyes. I wasn’t dangerous. I wasn’t loud. I was just a sick human being trying to get through the night.

Most people walked by.

And then one young guy slowed down and said, “Hey man, are you okay?”

That was it.

I told him yeah, I’d be fine. He nodded and kept going. It lasted maybe three seconds. But in those three seconds, something shifted. I wasn’t invisible anymore. I wasn’t just a disruption or an unappealing sight. I was a person.

And he saw me.

It made me feel immeasurably better - not physically, but existentially. It reminded me that even in the rush, even in a country that feels fractured and exhausted, there are still reflexes of care. Small ones. Quiet ones. But real.

Kindness is not grand. It’s not performative. It’s often inconvenient. But it is connective tissue. It stitches us together in moments where we could easily drift apart.

For actors, this is the work.

See people. Really see them. The man slumped against a tile wall. The woman gripping her coffee like it’s ballast. The teenager pretending not to cry. Consider who they are. Imagine the invisible thread of experiences that led them to this exact second. Let yourself wonder about their childhood, their heartbreak, their victories, their private fears.

Connection doesn’t start on stage. It starts in train stations. In pharmacies. In passing questions.

“Are you okay?”

We don’t need to fix each other. We don’t even need long conversations. Sometimes we just need to acknowledge: I see you. You’re not alone in this moment.

And that is profoundly human.