People always say that a good writer has ‘life experience’. Basically this translates as: a good writer
has a whole bunch of memories and adventures that they can draw on as
inspiration for their work, giving it that much needed sense of realism.
So to my mind, that means that a good writer should act a
little bit like Jim Carrey from Yes Man.
They should become the epitome of spontaneity; they should have eagerly outstretched
arms, ready to grasp every new opportunity that flies their way.
Which might explain why, when I got the opportunity to do a
modelling shoot, I confidently said yes before kicking my shy alter-ego
backwards into the freaky cupboard in my university room where she belongs.
And well, well, well, look who turned out to be called
‘talented’.
(Yes they may have been fibbing, but they still
said it.)
A week or so ago, I dragged one of my closest friends with
me to Leicester and spent about 3 hours in a studio; the focus of a camera
lens. We had numerous shots taken in numerous outfits, all the while laughing
about lighting and the inevitable language barriers we were having with our
Polish photographer – whose English was actually really good, and simply made
us realise that for two English students we use slang way too much
Suddenly, midway
through the shoot, confidence levels began to drop. Luckily, someone had some
rather eclectic but mood boosting music on their phone, (I tried not to cringe
too much when the familiar tones of Busted sounded out from my Blackberry….)
Then, a pink feather boa got brought out.
Cushions appeared.
Wind machines were
used and became known as ‘our little friend’.
All in all, it was
ever so slightly surreal.
But the fun didn’t stop there. We had to do an introductory
video about ourselves after the shoot where we suddenly transformed into
‘part-time models’ and got spoken to like we were professionals, rather than
two 20 year old English Undergrads who thought it sounded like something fun to
do on a Saturday afternoon…
Our egos were boosted even more that day by the lovely young
man who served us in the chip shop on the way to the station, as we guiltily gave
in to temptation and bought some chips to share on our way home. He said: ‘I’ve
given you some extra chips because you’re both so pretty, is that ok?’
We beamed, we blushed, we left.
But now I’m home, the excitement has died down a bit and
these niggling thoughts keep entering my head. Regarding the chips – yes of
course free fast food is a lovely gesture, and a true student would never dream of saying no! But another part of
me, deep in the depths of my conscience is saying, ‘Of course it’s ok! But when
I get fat because of all those extra chips would anyone think the same then?!’
I’ve also just seen my video. My first thoughts were ‘OH.MY.WORD.’
My hair is flat, I
have an annoying strand covering my eyelid and I ‘um’ and look down at the
script we got given way too much. Is this the start? Am I becoming too vain and
self-criticising? Am I becoming a REAL model?
I know. I need to swat the
thought away like I would one of those annoying flies that delight in buzzing around
your ear for hours.
Besides, I’ve finally seen some of
the photos from the shoot and I actually quite like them. Maybe a little
embarrassing, but truly they’re not that bad at all...(I hope)
Plus, it gave me another
subject for one of these blogs – maybe experiences really do create words…
