My Life as a Soap Opera

By: Karen Pilarski

Erica Kane has it easy. Of course she is a fictional soap character on “All My Children,” but her

life of cliff hangers, love affairs and tragedy is more exciting than mine. Why it is that life and

soap operas collide at times?

Me, I’m plain Jane trying to make my mark in the writing world. I don’t meddle in my friends’

lives. But between my own family and in-laws, sometimes high drama becomes a sudsy

entertainment for everyone to watch unfold.

I’m no Jennifer Aniston or Reese Witherspoon. I’m actually a rather boring character. My

character would be least likely get killed off by a microchip implanted in the brain or remarry a

long lost love after much endurance. In reality, my character would go into the kitchen to make

tea and not come back out for a few years.

By day I enter data, and the most exciting thing that happens to me in my job as a secretary, is

when I get a prank call. On my desk are piles of papers. No champagne chilling; just a regular

cup of java. Sometimes I spice it up by adding a half cappuccino. Wow, what a rebel. There are

no fancy martini glasses or suave men in silk suits hanging on my every word.

When I go home, I kick off the heels, and put on my ugly sweats—the one you wear at an all you

can eat buffet. Admit it, everyone does it.

My hair is almost always pulled in a messy ponytail. My bedspread is not made of fine silk. The

bedspread is a tattered old comforter.

Where Erica Kane would have a full bar with exotic liquors, I bide my time guzzling back a diet

coke. When I want to get down and funky I might drink a glass of cheap wine. Erica would be so

proud.

I don’t attend glitzy balls or fancy parties. Some Fridays I might go to a local bar and hang with

friends. Most often I’m watching my prized Sex and the City collection with my husband.

To listen to some folks, though, you’d think I was living in Pine Valley with my fourth

millionaire husband. Obviously, they’re not paying attention.

Whatever the case may be, life is not a soap opera. I spend my days trying do the best I can at

everything I do—work, grad school, friendships. I have never performed brain surgery in a cave

on a deserted island or rescued my father from a busty blond gold digger.

Unlike characters on a soap opera, we don’t come back from the dead when our contract is

renewed, or come back as a long lost identical twin with amnesia. I have a twin brother, so

unless he wears a wig, this won’t be happening.

We have one chance to make our lives worthwhile. Let’s spend it building each other up and

making ourselves and others happy. Let’s not move to Pine Valley just yet. Erica has plenty of

future bridesmaids at her fingertips.