So. I’m sitting here doing my taxes because you know, that’s exactly how I like to spend a snow-filled March weekend. This is the first year I will be itemizing, which means I have to add up all my receipts and figure out what I can write off and it initially sounded like a huge headache and it’s taking forever but you know, in the end, terms like “itemizing” and “deduction” and “Huge Ass Refund Check” kind of turn me on. I’m not gonna lie.

So I have to fill out some paperwork but I’ve enlisted help in the actual tax preparation since Equity does your taxes for free. And I love all things that cost free. Vegan Mike clued me in to this free-tax-preparation awesomeness though it required getting up super super early a few months ago and getting in a line full of actors in order to secure a slot. FUN.

Side Story: As I signed up that morning, totally bleary-eyed and bitter, a man whipped out a camera and ordered Vegan Mike and I to pose with a tax volunteer.

“What!?” I sputtered.

“Can I take your picture!?” the photographer asked.

“Um…I guess so?” I asked, still incredulous.

And before you know it, Vegan Mike and I are smiling at the camera with a tax volunteer man, who you can see is wearing a smashing yellow silk shirt and numerous gold chains. This picture goes down in history as one of my absolute favorite pictures taken, ever. For the record, I was told to “pretend” to sign in and hold my pen rather excitedly. This was because I had ALREADY signed in a few seconds before the cameraman approached me so then I had to go back and PRETEND to sign in to make the picture look spontaneous. And this is why I’m an actress, you guys. Because frankly, I’m good at it.

As this picture was being taken, I asked Mike through clenched teeth, “WHY DOES THIS ALWAYS HAPPEN TO ME?” He didn’t really have an answer but kind of agreed that this kind of stuff does indeed happen to me. I eventually shrugged it off and signed up to get my taxes done and forgot all about it. Until.

Until the photographer called me this week and asked if I could come in for an interview about TAXES so that he can publish the INTERVIEW and the PICTURE in an upcoming edition of the ACTOR’S EQUITY NEWSLETTER.

Um. I’ve asked it once and I’ll ask it again, WHY DOES SHIT LIKE THIS ALWAYS HAPPEN TO ME?! Now the entire acting world will know that not only do I look cute in a winter coat but that I am a GIGANTIC TOOL who is SUPEREXCITED about getting her TAXES DONE.

Sigh.

I’m thinking of finding that tax volunteer guy’s number and asking if he’s available to grab a drink sometime. Just a thought. Something about that shirt. Anyway…

In order to fill out all the paperwork, I had to pull out my receipts. Turns out I was absolutely terrible about keeping receipts for 2006. (Until I left for tour that is.) From January to September, I think I found about five receipts that could be used for write-offs. Well, I FOUND seven but I don’t think I can write off my speeding tickets from 2005, can I?

However, from September through December, I have every receipt ever printed out from anywhere, ever in the history of the world. Margot, my roommate on tour, advised me to keep everything, EVERYTHING because it would all be important come tax season. And oh, Margot, let’s make out because that was SUCH A GOOD IDEA.

I’ve been sitting here just flipping through the receipts and I have to admit something that I don’t really want to admit: I miss tour. I know I know! I couldn’t wait to get home! Actors are crazy! Children’s theater at 7:00 in the morning! Sucks! I know! But I can’t tell you what going through this paperwork does to me! Receipt after receipt after receipt and of course, they all look something like this:

CRACKER BARREL
WENDY’S
SUPER 8
CRACKER BARREL
SUBWAY
SUBWAY
SUBWAY
TARGET - FOR LUNA BARS AND LUNA BARS AND LUNA BARS AND DETERGENT
SUBWAY
RED ROOF INN
RED ROOF INN
CRACKER BARREL + RED ROOF INN + LUNA BARS

And that is how I spent my life on tour. Just so you know.

I ate really really well on tour. I was the girl, at every meal, who made you feel like a jerk for ordering anything with calories. I was queen of the chicken sandwich, no mayo, side salad with fat-free dressing, thank you but I’ll save you the trouble and kick my OWN ass. But this combined with my consistent jogging successfully kept me healthy, sane and only mildly annoying.

Oh by the way, apparently, I also enjoyed buying live farm animals. And it’s true, look how cheap things are in the South!

So anyway. When I wasn’t purchasing side salads and livestock, I did like to cheat. And I didn’t really cheat by ordering lots of french fries or steak or ice cream. I cheated with the best possible thing you can cheat with: pancakes. Because, my lovely loves as you should all know, I LOVE PANCAKES SO INCREDIBLY MUCH. There would come a time when I could no longer order turkey sandwiches without cheese and vegetables with a side of vegetables and in those times of great need, I turned to the one and only, Cracker Barrel.

Cracker Barrel is a phenomenon that I TOTALLY GOT INTO. Cracker Barrel AND Bob Evans, actually. For similar reasons. But, as we say on the street, Cracker Barrel was my boo. And we were in love. Margot hated The Cracker Barrel. With a vengeance. But. What. REALLY!? I mean, I guess I get it. Listen, I am anti-chain restaurant for the most part. They give me hives, what can I say? But I will GLADLY choose a Cracker Barrel over an Olive Garden and do you want to know why?

Of course you do.

Because Olive Garden is a crappy evil place that pretends to serve “home-cooked” “Italian” food. Are you KIDDING ME?! It’s a LIE. I have a hard time believing that my grandmother wants to go to Olive Garden because it tastes like the food she grew up with in Tuscany. A VERY HARD TIME BELIEVING THAT. You know why? Because Italian grandmothers don’t throw prepackaged breadsticks in an oven and call it Italian food. That’s why. Cracker Barrel, on the other hand, doesn’t put up an overindulgent marketing masquerade. Cracker Barrel claims to be exactly what it is: a place where everything is saturated in tons and tons of butter.

In fact, on their website, they totally avoid giving any nutritional information whatsoever. Why do you need it? They base their menu on Southern cooking and in the South, butter and lard and grease are STAPLES that not only enhance the meal but MAKE THE MEAL. Observe:

Is nutritional information available for your menu items? Here at Cracker Barrel, we pride ourselves on using recipes and ingredients that are authentic, genuine, and of the highest quality available. We strive to prepare and present these food items to you in a way that upholds those authentic traditions of days gone by. Cracker Barrel certainly understands the health-conscious concerns that some of our guests have. While we are unable to give you any exact calorie or fat content information…

Of course you can’t give me exact calorie or fat content information because if you did, Cracker Barrel, I would NEVER frequent your establishment. Ever. But I did. Because you serve up mighty nice turkey sausage and buttery pancakes. That’s why. And the point of this entire thing is that I MISS THAT.

Things would be very different if I went on tour again, especially now that I’m vegan and no longer enjoy my pancakes with a side of cow hormones. And also because I would never be with that same group of people again. We still hang out, some of us, and others, I run into at auditions but the thing with tour life is that forces intimacy. You learn to exist in a bubble with six other people and your life revolves around communicating with them. It’s kind of like being in a spaceship. Well. No, it’s kind of like college where you can always find someone to talk to and someone to go to dinner with and someone to rub your back while you watch bad television. I miss college for these reasons and I miss tour-life, too.

I’ve always hated receipts. Still do sometimes, especially when the cashier hands it to me in the same pile as my change because then I need to separate the money from the paper and oh, whatever, I hate sorting it out. But the more I think about it, the more I think that a receipt is an anal retentive’s dream. It’s one more way to compartmentalize my life. After all, they are a meticulous recording system, stamped with date, time, place and my server’s name (Brittny B.) They leave a paper trail that notes where I was, what I was doing and that I had a fruit cup instead of fries. Above all though, these particular receipts ignite an emotional response in me; they are my memories printed out on glossy slips of paper.

Sitting outside in 85 degree heat, above the Gulf in Mobile, Alabama, trying a hushpuppy for the first time.

Our 7-day sit-down in Cleveland, Ohio where Margot and I ate at the Winking Lizard Tavern EVERY SINGLE DAY.

Eating pasta and drinking wine on a freezing cold day in Brampton, Ontario.

Going for a run in Raleigh, North Carolina and discovering a secluded quaint neighborhood that I wanted to move into. Buying a Dasani water at the CVS on my way back home.

Eating Thai food twice in a row with Vegan Mike and Margot because, well, because. Thai food is vegan deliciousness.

Killing time with Melissa and Rance, nearly 3 hours, in a Cracker Barrel while we waited for the van to be fixed.

I remember this clearly. We were talking about auditioning and the ups and downs and I confessed to them that right before I booked the tour, I had made up my mind to give up trying to get work as an actor. Maybe it would’ve been a temporary break, maybe it would’ve been permanent. But I was done with the rejection, done with mistakenly taking it all personally, done with caring. And then I booked the show. And left New York. And there I was, in Augusta, Georgia at a Cracker Barrel.

And they shared more stories of theirs, crazy hilarious audition stories. And I was laughing again, forgetting how close I had come to missing out on the entire experience. I was happy to be there, in the air conditioning, sitting across from two strangers that would quickly become TV buddies and dinner companions and people who still text me and tell me that they miss me.

I miss them too.

Oh and I had a cup of vegetable soup, a hot tea, turkey sausage and pancakes.

It says so on my receipt.