Nine Times Out of Ten
In the serio-comedy monologue Nine Times Out of Ten, Andy has trouble facing the reality that he might be a bit off.
ANDY: The way I act. (beat) I was thinking about it. In the shop, a woman, after I helped her, I overheard her say to someone else in the neighboring aisle that I seemed off.
To me, if I call someone off, it means they are off, as in, crazy or not wrapped too tight. Like, something’s not working right upstairs.
This woman called me off, and it got me wondering…maybe she’s right. Maybe I do come off weird to people. (beat) I’ll tell you something I did once. I took a tango class. I was locked in my house for a month straight, it was one of those months, I just couldn’t feel right. I didn’t see or talk to no-one. Didn’t leave the house. I had to break free. So, I signed up for tango lessons in the city.
Now, I went, and you know…you go in a circle, you dance around the room with different partners, and each partner I danced with was very strange…as in, off. But now, now I’m beginning to think it was me the entire time. Maybe I’m the one that’s off. Maybe my brain isn’t working right, and I’ve been busy worried about how everyone else’s brain functions.
Then I started thinking about my life and my relationships, and I’ve finally come to the conclusion that the woman in the shop who said I was off was right. She’s right. And what do I do about it? Now that it’s clear to me. How do I navigate this revelation?
Now I question myself, the things I say, the things I do, when I laugh, how I laugh… I watch, and I ask myself if what I do is normal.
Nine times out of ten, it seems off. I keep trying to correct my wrongs; at least I think they’re wrongs, you know? Maybe I laughed too intensely over something, or I think I said something stupid, and I go days, days regretting it—I suffer depression now, confusion, DOUBT, I catch myself staring at birds… I think about the birds and wonder if they too have any self-conscious thoughts.
A hawk landed on someone’s balcony, and it fascinated me. Its wingspan was gorgeous. I watched as the other birds flew by this hawk, and fear overtook them.
They’d fly close, but once they realized who they were flying close to, they would suddenly flutter their wings and bolt for the nearest tree. You think those smaller birds regret flying too close to the hawk?
..After I snapped out of my trance, I cried. I cried because it was confirmation that I must be off. All I know is that I am and I’ve accepted it. I am who I am.
- To read the full one-act ePlay, find purchase link below:
In the one-act eplay Nine Times Out of Ten, Andy talks to his best friend Ishi about how a customer in the shop he works at called him “off” and he can’t seem to shake the truth of it. 1 Woman, 1 Man. Serio-comedy.
