Comedian Sara Schaefer has hosted an MTV talk show (“Nikki & Sara Live”), had an innovative interview podcast (Lies) and earned an Emmy blogging for Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. Hear a tale involving hygiene homework, middle school ridicule and Right Guard.
Hi this is Sara Schaefer, today I’m gonna tell you a story that’s from my album and my life.
Alright, so it’s the very first week of middle school and in gym class our first assignment was to collect a little tub of supplies for our little gym locker, and one of the items on the list was deodorant. There was no way that I was gonna have a discussion with my mom about deodorant. I mean that was just gross. We don’t talk about those types of things. But, at the same time, I was a huge nerd and I really wanted to get an A on this assignment.
As the week went on, I was becoming increasingly more angry at my mother for not predicting that I needed deodorant and just leaving it on the table there for me. So it’s the day it’s due and we’re about to leave the house and I’m just like, “MOM!”
And she is like, “What? Oh my God! What?”
“I need deodorant.”
“What? When?”
“Now!”
“Well, what kind?”
“Secret, Jasmine Breeze. Specifically Jasmine Breeze.”
“Alright, let me go through the — hold on,” she’s going through a cabinet, and she’s like, “Oh, oh this will work.”
She puts down a 64 ounce can of spray Right Guard.
“No! That’s for Shaquille O’Neal!”
And she’s like, “I don’t care! You waited till the last minute. This is what procrastination causes. You’re taking it to school. Now put it in your backpack!”
I get to school. I’m not taking it out in the locker room, no way, no way. So I go up to the teacher, I unzip my backpack and I just creak it open and I show it to the teacher and I’m just like, “We good?”
She is like, “Yeah.”
Ok, avoided embarrassment. But then it dawns on me. I can’t take this can of deodorant back home, because my mom, if she sees it, she would be so mad that I made such a big deal, was so dramatic and I didn’t actually even turn it in.
So at this point, it’s like a dead body I have to get rid of. And, I was by my regular locker — it was just a magical quiet moment and I just quickly put it on the top shelf of the locker and then I delicately leaned a Luke Perry “90210” folder up against it and I was like, “Ok, that looks pretty good.” I shut my locker and I walk away.
Cut to the end of the school year. It’s time to get it out of that locker. I gotta clean out my locker and I was just going to tip it into my backpack, but right before I could do that, Billy — you know who you are. I am not changing your first name because you are not innocent. He slammed his hand on the locker next to me, just to startle me, and caused the Luke Perry folder to fall forward and float down to the ground, in slow motion, like a feather.
Billy’s eyes locked with the can of Right Guard and he was just like, “EVERYBODY! AHHHOOOOOH,” summoning the whole school. Everyone gathers around and he’s like, “Sara Schaefer is a man!”
He grabs the can of deodorant and he’s like, “[spraying noises] Better spray it all up, spray it up and down.”
And I’m like, “No, no, no! Don’t do that. That’s probably gonna make you sterile. Seriously, don’t do that.”
Anyway, everyone laughed. I disintegrated into a pile of dust, reconstituted myself and then walked backwards slowly to the bus holding, my head down in shame. It’s a sad story, but, don’t feel bad for me, ’cause he’s dead… I’m just kidding, I don’t think he’s dead. I just like to imagine that. He’s probably a really nice guy. He’s probably got kids.
